Metaverse set to create a parallel universe, writes Zubin Jimmy Dubash

Zubin Jimmy Dubach, a Top 200 Global Digital Business Leader and thought-leader, has been at the forefront of new-age digital businesses - OTT, Entertainment, Content, Gaming, Apps and Payments for over 2 decades. Currently, helming Digital Businesses at Shemaroo Entertainment, he articulates his thoughts on the future of the Metaverse & Web 3 spaces.

“Metaverse” – is among the most searched keywords in recent times, especially after Facebook’s name-change to Meta. The world is abuzz with how our lifestyles will be transformed in the coming years. Analysts predict an $800Bn opportunity by 2025, and India is among the front runners in the space.

So, what is the Metaverse?

The Metaverse is a parallel virtual universe, in which you exist as a digital avatar, meet, interact with other avatars and lead a virtual life. You can date, marry, have a family, socialise with friends, go to school, have business meetings. You live in a home, go for a workout, drive a car, watch movies, play games, go to a concert, watch a live virtual cricket match, travel, visit a temple, eat out, go shopping, transact, invest and trade in virtual assets like houses, art, collectables etc. Simply put on your AR/VR headsets, and you can practically do everything that you do in the real life. You need to shop, transact and buy stuff – better known as NFTs or Digital Assets. From farmhouses to food, to fashion, to fuel, to furniture - everything can be bought and stored as NFT (Non-Fungible Tokens), that run on Blockchain technology, which is the crux and base of the next version of the internet also known as Web 3.0. Unlike the Internet, there will be several thousand Metaverses, which will eventually be seamlessly inter-operable.

Early drivers

Meta’s pegging an investment of $10bn on the Metaverse, with a $50m R&D fund to promote Metaverse awareness. Meta will lead the Metaverse Gaming, Socialising and Entertainment spaces with its Oculus device play. Microsoft’s playing the “All-in” game. Its recent $69bn acquisition of Activison Blizzard, makes it a giant in the Gaming Space. “Mesh for Teams”, gives users an experience to immerse into face-to-face meetings using their 3D avatars. The Metaverse will have a version of Ms Office, that will seamlessly take us from our internet world to the Metaverse. Disney patent for “a virtual-world simulator in a real-world venue”- a Metaverse experience “without” AR/VR Headsets. Disney believes that the phygital experience will offer far higher impact. Roblox’s Metaverse offers the next version of a Facebook experience – immersive experiences of meeting friends, shopping, visiting places, dining out and with each of these transactions, Roblox Metaverse collects a fee, which is the core revenue model of the Metaverse. Epic Games, raised $1bn, to build immersive experiences in their popular 3D games Fortnite, Rocket League, and Fall Guys, while empowering game developers with Unreal Engine, Epic Online Services, and the Epic Games Store. With over 60m MAUs, they aim to grow to 1bn in the near future. Semiconductor giant NVIDIA will offer a set of Metaverse software tools for creating and selling content within virtual worlds - Nvidia plans to distribute a free version of its "Omniverse" software for creating virtual worlds to individual artists. Tencent has also announced a $10bn investment in building a Metaverse.

India in the Metaverse action

India is among the top nations, leading Metaverse developments. Mark Zukerberg said, “India will shape the future of the Metaverse”. With 440m gamers, India already stands tall in Metaverse adoption. Additionally, use cases around owning land, art, and Digital Humans will emerge. Bolly Heroes, is a parallel Bollywood Metaverse - an amalgamation of Bollywood stars, gaming studios, music labels. Users can create their own customised Bollywood stories and scripts. They have launched Bollyverse, a limited edition NFT storefront. Alt Balaji and MX Player will be launching their live digital Metaverse reality show “Lock-Up”. OneRare is a food Metaverse, that asks users to claim their favourite dishes by following the recipes and farming the right ingredients. Loka, is a multiplayer virtual Metaverse game. It maps real-world cities and locations and allows users to interact with their favourite third-party apps like Netflix, Zomato app and so on. Cryptic Entertainment recently held a Metaverse concert featuring singer Sparsh Dangwal with 25 fans who attended the show in the Metaverse, using Somium Space VR headsets. Fans could be seen dancing and mingling with each other. Hungama and T-series are creating an NFTs and Metaverse platform under the name Hefty. And recently announced acquiring NFT rights for MF Hussain’s art. On Republic Day, Daler Mehndi hosted a Metaverse concert at PartyNite.io where his fans could groove with him in the virtual concert. And in Tamil Nadu, a couple hosted their wedding reception in the Metaverse.

Devices

The real lens to the Metaverse will come through wearable AR/VR headsets and smart glasses that provide a truly immersive experience. All Android and iOS smartphones are AR-enabled, and a flurry of brands will launch their own AR / VR headsets. The largest-selling is Meta’s Oculus which has clocked 10m+ device sales. Microsoft's HoloLens and Google Glass, Snap Inc Spectacles, Sony PSVRs, HTC range, Varjo, Lenovo Star Wars, Nreal, Merge AR/VR Headset, MagicLeap, Epson Moverio, Raptor AR headset are the other players in the space, and many more players will enter. Jio Glass along with other Indian, start-ups like AjnaLens and Question What’s Real are also building their devices. The headset market forecasts $300bn by 2025, a 10x jump from 30.7bn in 2021. Says Ninad Chhaya, Co-founder & COO of GoPhygital, an AR/VR and Web3 Solutions company, “We started 5 years back, when very few could understand the future of the space. In recent times it is heartening to see the massive increase in inquiries for solutions for the creator economy like Play-To-Earn (P2E), Digital Humans, and more.”

Cryptocurrencies

To transact in the Metaverse, you will need Cryptocurrencies - the currencies of the virtual world. Your transaction details are stored in a decentralised public ledger which run on Blockchain technology, and currencies are stored in digital wallets. It’s a peer-to-peer system that enables anyone to send and receive payments. The popular ones out there are Bitcoin, Ether (ETH) that runs on the Ethereum Blockchain, Binance, Tether, Solana, Polka Dot, Terra, Litecoin, and Ripple.

NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens)

You go for an auction in the real world and pick up a piece of MF Hussain art that you are proud to own. Now think of going shopping in the Metaverse - you buy a pair of exclusive Virat Kholi designed Nike shoes. There is only one such virtual pair priced at $1m. This unique piece is an NFT or a Non- Fungible-Token. You pay with cryptocurrencies, and now “own” it. NFTs are Digital assets that are stored on Blockchain in the form of smart contracts. NFT marketplaces enable buying and selling of NFTs. Amitabh Bachchan’s NFT poetry recitals were recently sold for $1m. The global NFT market will grow from $30Bn in 2021 to $80bn by 2025. Says Dr Praphul Chandra, CEO & Founder at KoineArth, a fast-growing NFT startup, “We believe that NFTs are the commerce backbone of the Metaverse. Every digital asset becomes an NFT - from digital art, fashion, digital cars. Brands can sell these digital assets on our platform “ngageN”, which works just like an e-commerce platform, and users can pay in INR using Digital payments in just a few clicks. According to USISPF, NFT and Web3.0 in India could take India’s GDP to $1trillion by 2032. In Budget 2022, the Government has declared legalised NFTs and Crypto as VDA (Virtual Digital Assets).

Creator economy in the Metaverse

Metaverse adds a new dimension to creativity, and content, and hence opens up a massive opportunity for the Creator Economy to expand with 3D web. In Dec 21, the creator economy was worth $105bn, with over 100m creators just in gaming and video. By 2024 this number is projected to grow to $230bn, and with the Gold rush in Metaverse Creators across the world, this number will jump to $400bn by 2027.

Brands announce their entry into the Metaverse with NFTs

When dressing plays a key part in our physical lifestyles, it will play a bigger role in our virtual lives. In the physical world, we have different attire for each part of our day - from party to casual, to formal, to night ware. Mirroring that behaviour our virtual “looks” formed by avatars (Digital Humans), will need different looks for each occasion and that’s where fashion brands will play big part in the Metaverse story.

A flurry of global fashion brands including Paris Hilton, Balenciaga, Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Ralph Loren, Burberry, Balmain X Barbie has announced their entry into the Metaverse with a range of classic and latest designer wear for the Metaverse. Nike’s recent acquisition of RTFKT, a virtual shoes company that makes NFTs and sneakers for the Metaverse. Arch rival Adidas acquired a plot of land in a popular Metaverse platform called “Sandbox”, built a virtual showroom and displayed its first range of NFTs. On July 21, Coca-Cola launched its own NFT auction that fetched over $0.5m for its range of friendship based NFTs. Gucci held a virtual exhibition on May 21.

Gaming is by far the biggest. Roblox, Epic Games’ Fortnite, and Grand Theft Auto already have Metaverse-like platforms. Fornite, with over 400m users, had 5.4bn hours of game time in Dec 2021. The global virtual reality gaming market will grow from $7.92b in 2021 to $53.44b in 2028.

Live concerts: allow users to watch their favourite stars perform and dance and sing with them in the virtual world. Fortnite’s recent Ariana Grande concert and Roblox’s Twenty One Pilots concert experience have been runaway hit Record tickets and merchandise sales. The Travis Scott concert in Fortnite, a Metaverse, generated 12.3m attendees, 27m users and 46m views.

Immersive Social Experiences: Imagine a “Facebook-like” social network experience through Oculus. Users will be able to meet, socialise and bond in the virtual world using avatars. Even today Roblox has millions of users, meeting and interacting on the platform.

Immersive Theatre: Users will be able to immerse themselves in the film and watch it from different angles. Metaverse Theatres will offer unlimited premium seats as the space will always be in abundance.

Live Sports: eSports and other live sporting action will give users a transformational experience, with 3D immersion.

M-Commerce & Retail: Real or virtual life, commerce will exist. You will be able to walk into a supermarket, and with your cart, chuck in all your items, walk down to the cashier and pay with crypto wallets and walk out with all your goodies. Wallmart, Carrefour and others are creating an entire Metaverse experience of retail purchases.

Virtual Fashion: Morgan Stanley predicts a $50 billion-plus Metaverse opportunity for the luxury industry by 2030. With Virtual Avatars being dressed up, the fashion, glamour and accessory brands across the world are in for a massive shift in demand and monetisation.

Workspace: Work From Home will have an all-new meaning. You will be able to be at home and take a meeting while sitting across the table with your boss in a 3D experience. In time, commercial real estate in the physical world will get disrupted with Metaverse workspace experiences.

Real-estate: Prices of Metaverse real-estate has risen 500% in the last few months. Land was sold for $450,000 to be Snoop Dogg’s neighbour, in Sandbox another virtual land Metaverse. Canadian brand Token.com bought a piece of land on Decentraland for $2.5m. Property Trading in the Metaverse is touted to become a $210bn market by 2025.

Travel: Many environment-conscious travellers will give up flying to travel and move to meta-travel experiences, thereby reducing their carbon consumption. They will visit exotic new places from their homes using their VR wearables to get an immersive experience of their places.

Automotive Industry: Vehicle simulation will be the driving use case for the Automotive space. Virtual test drives will be simulated in the Metaverse for users before they buy their cars.

Digital Advertising: With a parallel lifestyle in the Metaverse, the opportunity is over $400b by 2028. Eventually, every traditional and digital advertising opportunity existing today will see a cascade into the Metaverse.

Education: AR/VR will help avail the best form of education and skills from academia across the world. Students will be able to immerse themselves into class and sit in their seats while attending a lecture. AI/ML tools would be used for assessments and grading, even better than what exists today.

Fitness: Imagine you having a yoga session on Mars, or go for a run at an Olympic Stadium? – everything is possible in the Metaverse. Meta recently bought ‘Within’, the creators of ‘Supernatural’ a VR Fitness app, that takes users into an immersive fitness experience with trainers, and helps them with their routines.

Customer Care: By 2025 all customer interactions will be managed by AI-powered Digital Humans that will understand human facial recognitions and languages to give customers the most seamless experience ever. Practically every service industry, both B2B and B2C, will need Digital Humans to take over customer interactions, making it the Biggest B2B use case.

A huge opportunity lies ahead

Metaverse is 3 Dimensional Internet, which will have a massive impact on society. A good part of Our 24-hour day will be spent in the virtual world. With new technology, transformation and adoption will follow. India is poised to see massive growth in the next 2 years. Gaming, Ed-Tech, Big Tech, Content Creator Economies, DeFi, Digital Art, NFTs and Cryptocurrencies, Digital Humans, are all set to grow exponentially. Over 150 start-ups have begun action. This new era of the Metaverse will unleash amazing creativity and open up new frontiers and horizons for brands and businesses. The future looks bright, as we move from On Screen to In-Screen!

Published on: Sunday, February 27, 2022, 12:37 PM IST