In 2019, 4 Roads won a BIMA award, in the Technology Above £70k category, for the AR/AI interactive digital display it built for Hitachi Vantara. The exhibition stand let delegates at Hitachi Vantara's annual conference configure its hardware racks and see them in 3D, instead of the company shipping real racks and putting them up.
What did Hitachi Vantara want?
Hitachi Vantara, part of the Hitachi Group, runs a conference every year to show customers and partners what the next 12 months will hold. It would ordinarily ship hardware racks there and put them up, to show its new solutions and how they can be configured.
It wanted a new way to show its whole portfolio that would surprise and delight delegates, and a partner to bring its product range to life with a digital experience.
What did 4 Roads build?
An exhibition stand where, instead of a static demo model, customers and prospects configured a hardware rack to their exact requirements and saw, in 3D, how it would look and work in place: much as a car buyer might specify a new car on a manufacturer's website.
- A six-foot 'totem' touch screen on the conference floor, for building a configuration from the product range.
- A chatbot that used artificial intelligence to answer basic questions about the range, pass complex ones to a sales representative and book face-to-face appointments.
- Configurations that delegates could store and send to their smartphone.
Afterwards, 4 Roads added augmented reality to the same system: Project Sight, which showed a rack's performance metrics on stage at Hitachi NEXT 2019.
4 Roads supported Hitachi's event teams on site, showing delegates how the display worked and bringing people to the virtual rack on the stand.
Speaking as the shortlist was announced, Robert Nash, 4 Roads' director, said:
“I’m delighted 4 Roads has been shortlisted for a prestigious BIMA award as we continue our journey to become the UK’s best intelligent self-service agency.”
The BIMA Awards took place on Wednesday 18 September 2019, at IET London, Savoy Place, and 4 Roads won. How 4 Roads builds apps and augmented reality.
Updated on 19 September 2026.
