A year and a half after Facebook announced its big commitment to the metaverse (even going so far as to change the name of its parent company to Meta), the state of this technology is still in its infancy. The consumer is far from living in a parallel reality, where he can go to work or consume goods in the same way that he would in the physical world.
At the moment, the closest experiences to this virtual world continue to be obtained through technologies that have been on the market for years: virtual reality, a scenario in which the user has the sensation of being inside it; augmented reality, which allows layers of virtual elements to be added to the physical world; 3D technology, which recreates an object or image in three dimensions as if it were real; or NFT technology, which allows you to create unique works of art through blockchain or block chain technology.
"As much as there are companies that claim to offer experiences in the metaverse, this statement is still false: technology is not fluid, continuous and open, but rather exists in a timely and limited way," says Enrique San Juan, a consultant specializing in social networks. and technology, which reminds us that access to these experiences is still within the reach of very few. In fact, the glasses that allow you to have a virtual experience are valued at more than 1,000 euros.
However, the industry continues to move into the metaverse. In recent months, Microsoft and Meta have announced a joint plan to create the virtual office of the future. In addition, 600 large companies from the world of technology and consumer goods have promoted a consortium to launch an open metaverse on the market. Among them is Meta itself as well as Alibaba, the World Wide Web consortium, Ikea, Huawei or Epic Games. At the technological level, more advanced versions of the glasses have also come out that allow immersive experiences. Among them, the Oculus Quest Pro, Meta's favorites.
“The industry continues to make progress at the rate expected. In fact, Mark Zuckerberg already said on the day he announced his commitment to the metaverse that the arrival to the mass public would not take place for another 10 years and that the development of technology would be slow, ”says San Juan.
In addition, he believes that the metaverse has lost some of its appeal since ChatGPT broke out late last year, the platform that has popularized generative artificial intelligence (which generates words or images intuitively and fluidly). “This technology has displaced the media attention that the metaverse had generated to date. Now, it is no longer the novelty, but that does not mean that the industry does not advance or that it has ceased to be important. At least in the case of Meta, which made such a big bet that now it is very difficult for it to back down”, reasons the consultant. In fact, this big tech assured that it was going to invest around 36,000 million dollars in the development of this parallel virtual reality.
San Juan also does not consider that the wave of cuts experienced by large technology companies significantly affects investment in this technology. “The digital sector oversized its forces during the coronavirus pandemic due to the boom in online commerce during the months that the confinement lasted. For this reason, the industry is now experiencing a period of correction marked by massive layoffs of workers. However, their innovation plans remain in force because their success in the future depends on it”. The exception is the crypto assets sector, which has seen its valuations sink due to a deep reputational crisis with the bankruptcy of the FTX platform and other minor companies. As a consequence, the NFT industry (for which trading takes place in the metaverse) is slowing down. According to data from the Chainalysis consultancy, if at the beginning of 2021 these crypto assets generated around a million operations, by the end of 2022 the figure has fallen to more than half (491,000).
In any case, it seems clear that the technologies linked to the metaverse will continue advancing without making as much noise as in the beginning. And proof of this can be found in this edition of the MWC, which is being held this week at the Fira de Barcelona venue in l'Hospitalet de Llobregat in an edition that hopes to recover the pulse after the pandemic.
The Mobile World Capital Barcelona Foundation is convinced of its potential and that is why they will present different use cases at the congress. “The metaverse will be one more piece on the internet and will have transversal applications. In the healthcare world we can already experience remote assistance to operations, in the industrial world digital twin technologies are applied and in the coming years experiences in leisure and tourism will grow”, comments Eduard Martín, director of intelligent connectivity of the foundation.
Although the uses of the technologies that will support the metaverse are limited, the market has high hopes for this innovation. According to data from the consulting firm Mckinsey, the industry has the potential to generate a business value of five trillion dollars in 2030, when it has reached the mass public.
