The metaverse market could grow more than 13% year-on-year
Another of the greats in the consulting sector of the world such as Gartner defines a metaverse as «a collective virtual shared space, created by the convergence of a virtually enhanced physical and digital reality. It is persistent, provides enhanced immersive experiences, as well as being device agnostic and accessible through any type of device, from tablets to head-mounted displays.”
Because no single vendor will own the metaverse, Gartner expects it to have a virtual economy enabled by digital currencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The metaverse will affect every business that consumers interact with every day.
These virtual and shared 3D worlds, in which video games have so far played a predominant role, are intended to be a convergence between the physical and digital realms, the evolution of the internet and social networks, and of course, a new opportunity for companies online and social networks capitalize on these new sources of income.
And as video game creators continue to bring their existing titles into the new 3D online world, increasingly equating interaction between gamers with social media, the market opportunity may expand into live entertainment with events like concerts and sporting events. Based on existing analyses, by 2024 the total metaverse market size is expected to be 2.7 times larger than current advertising revenue in video game software and services.
Image: Bloomberg
Video game creators like Epic Games and Roblox have already hosted concerts within their video games. Revenues from live online entertainment businesses could become part of the overall concept of the metaverse, including movie screenings, music events, and sports. Bloomberg expects this item could top $180 billion in revenue by 2024.
Roblox, Epic, and Microsoft lead the metaverse, but strong competition looms
While Roblox, Microsoft’s Minecraft, and Epic Games’ Fortnite are early leaders in the race for metaverse leadership, there’s plenty of time ahead for other video game creators, and of course, social media, to modify their existing services or launch new games. new worlds oriented to the metaverse. Currently, the panorama of companies in the metaverse has prominent players such as:
video game creators
- Roblox
- Epic Games
- Microsoft
- Activision Blizzard (Acquired by Microsoft in 2021)
- take-two
- Tencent
- NetEase
- Nexon
- Valve
developers
- Unity
- Epic Games
- Adobe
- Autodesk
- Ansys
Social media
- Goal
- Tencent
Gaming, AR, and VR
- Goal
- Lenovo
- hp
- Logitech
- steel
- Valve
- Razer
live entertainment
- live nation
- theme parks
- Sports Teams
Of course, it should be noted that Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard in January 2022, which became the largest transaction of the Redmond company in its 46-year history and, of course, a step that puts Microsoft in a position of privilege in the race for the metaverse for gamers, with such well-known titles as World of Warcraft.
Some of the known metaverses… so far
Although the first name that comes to mind for the general public when thinking about the metaverse is Meta, the reality is that there are multiple virtual reality spaces available to the public, apart from massive video games such as Fortnite, Roblox, or World of Warcraft.
The first is Mesh, Microsoft’s metaverse that it defines as “a persistent digital world, connected to many aspects of the physical world”, a digital environment to help people meet more comfortably and facilitate creative development no matter where they are. , a new world to which Microsoft arrives thanks to Teams, its business communication, and collaboration platform, and in which Linkedin could play a relevant role shortly.
But as we said, there are many more metaverse proposals, such as Zepeto, of South Korean origin: this platform was launched in August 2018 and currently has more than 200 million registered users and around two million active users per day, it is not surprising that for this reason, it is the metaverse in which Zara opted to carry its first collection of mixed clothing.
And speaking of fashion for the metaverse, Pull&Bear recently announced its arrival in this digital universe through ReadyPlayer Me, the multigame avatar platform for the metaverse. Soon the clothing firm will launch its own video game.
Decentralized Metaverses
But the concept of the metaverse is not something new nor has it been discovered by Zuckerberg, it is increasingly present and has a lot of life ahead of it. As Sergio García, from the specialized blockchain agency Floc, told us in an episode of our podcast, there are other lesser-known proposals such as Decentraland, Cryptovoxels, and Sandbox.game, Somnium Space, Axie Infinity and Webaverse.
As Sergio explained to us, in these decentralized metaverses «every person who has tokens has decision-making power, you own as much percentage of tokens you have in the community, like a small shareholder with votes for certain decisions and votes. There is a nucleus that creates the bases and statutes of the platform.
Each organization is going to have its norms and rules, there will be a distribution of tokens, in that distribution that are generated over time, it gives benefits to those who participate and generate, but there will also be people who buy and sell what you have bought. Another thing you can do is go to events, meet other users and watch YouTube or Twitch videos.
An hour a day in the metaverse in 2026
If you thought the metaverse was a fad, it’s not. Gartner predicts that 25% of people will spend at least one hour per day in the metaverse by 2026, whether for work, shopping, classes, socializing, or entertainment.
In any case, the transition to the metaverse will be more demanding than the furor around the term may imply. Dan Rabinovitsj, vice president of connectivity for Meta, explained on Monday at MWC that internet connection networks, both fixed and mobile, are not yet ready for the metaverse: “We are working closely with our colleagues to think about what is the next step in terms of innovation. If you look at the pace of innovation in the telecom world, compared to other markets, it’s been harder to go faster in this environment,” Rabinovitsj said. “One of the things we’ve tried to change is that trajectory of innovation.”
Mark Zuckerberg himself recently explained that “creating a true sense of presence in virtual worlds delivered to smart glasses and VR headsets will require massive advances in connectivity.” Thus, these advances must be “bigger than any of the transitions we have seen before.” Zuckerberg explained that large-scale immersive video streaming will require entirely new types of networks. In any case, the Meta itself has a privileged position in this field, having its own devices to connect to the metaverse, such as Oculus glasses.
Source:
Galeano, S. (2022d, March 3). X-Ray of the Metaverse: An $800 Billion Market in 2024. Marketing 4 Ecommerce – Your online marketing magazine for e-commerce. Retrieved March 7, 2022, from https://marketing4ecommerce.mx/radiografia-del-metaverso-un-mercado-de-700-000me-en-2024/
