A company I work for is planning on putting some small Manufacturing plants in South America to expand our operations. We would plan on bringing the new employees to our U.S. location for training. Of course, we can't train them 100% on all that might go wrong, or what to do in unusual situations. Therefore we will need to assist them on these things from our U.S. office.
On other job's I've done 3-D design of large weldments. Sometimes I would be called by the shop to answer a question, and was able to answer it just talking on the phone. But, it was usually easier to physically go up and help resolve an issue. In this case, the shop was only a 50' walk. Physcialy going to another country is certainly a barrier to quick resolutions of these things.
I was thinking that a simple mobile base 4 or 5 foot high, with a laptop and webcam on top, could be a big help. It could be connected to Internet via WiFi, and remotely operated in our office in the U.S. While the user in the U.S. could remotely drive it into the shop, I suspect that it would be more practical to just let the S.A. user wheel it to the area in the shop where they have the question. In the simplest implementation, the base isn't even motorized, but the camera is an off-the-shelf tilt and pan. The only non-standard thing I would add is a motorized laser pointer... and perhaps that could simply be glued to the camera and just aimed at a downward angle, so that when you aim the camera at a person, you aren't shooting the laser at their face.
In usage, the S.A. guy wheels it to an area in the shop where they are having a problem with a machine, and then initiates a video call to the U.S. office. The guy in S.A. can describe the problem while pointing with his hand to the problem area saying "There are sometime bubbles in the material when it comes out here." The guy in the U.S. can use the laser pointer to point out where he thinks there needs to be adjustment. The cameras could be aimed down at a paper so a user can sketch solutions as well.
The above is certainly cheap to do, since it only involves existing stuff that an office or shop may have. When I've attempted to use other existing web-cam robots, the time lag and slow framerate made it useless in my view.
I may report back here when I get a chance to try a simple unit out on my own. But, at the moment, things like firewalls and other stuff to protect our network have become barriers outside of my direct control.
Joe Dunfee