The Metaverse, 2022, hottest tech topic. Technology has not swept the public’s imagination quite like the Metaverse for a while. Audiences at-large in 2022 were in the perfect place to understand some of the potential of the Metaverse, and equally, many savey firms were ready to engage audiences with grand promises.
Many consumer-led Metaverse anticipation was led by firms such as Meta, which completely rebranded based on its Metaverse predictions. Companies and Metaverse experts frequently use Ready Player One and other mainstream media examples to help audiences digest what a Metavese could be.
While this could be negative in the long run, thanks to significant promises being made and not being met within consumers’ quick turnaround expectations, but also the wave of hype helped to establish a virtual future where individuals can socialize and work, even if there is still work to be made towards designating those digital platforms.
While consumer-interested may have peaked currently, with attention moving towards AI hype. The enterprise space is still fresh, with examples of business Metaverse solution providers and SDKs creating secure and reliable virtual solutions for various end-users.
Moreover, the world of branded Metaverse content remains strong, with brands leveraging digital spaces or events on Metaverse services to increase awareness of their products.
Introducing the Panialists SynergyXR and Virbela
Many expert firms are ready to introduce a digital transformation journey to various vertical use cases within the enterprise Metaverse space. To help study enterprise-grade Metaverse use cases and standards, XR Today has secured two CEOs from leading enterprise Metaverse companies:
- Mads Troelsgaard, CEO, SynergyXR
- Alex Howland, CEO, Virbela
SynergyXR is a cloud platform that significantly gives enterprise end-users XR training and management tools to improve training, maintenance, and customer outreach procedures.
The enterprise-optimised platform performs seamlessly on many AR/VR/MR devices from headset vendors such as HTC VIVE, Meta, and Microsoft, allowing firms to leverage XR for a range of use cases, including remote guidance, training, and repair solutions.
Moreover, Virbela is an enterprise-grade collaboration Metaverse environment which can facilitate digital office for workplace operations.
The firm works hard with companies to create a united workplace culture on Metaverse platforms. Firms such as eXp Realty, a residential real estate brokerage, use Virbela to host virtual offices supporting roughly 83,000 agents in the US and Canada. The move saves eXp Reality capital on real-world offices and related costs.
What are the most promising use cases for Metaverse platforms in the enterprise?
Mads Troelsgaard:
While there’s almost an endless number of potential use cases for corporate Metaverse platforms, some of the most promising (in our opinion) are technical training and education, sales, marketing (e.g., trade shows and fairs), and employee onboarding.
Technical training and education can be enhanced by using metaverse platforms because they allow trainees to learn in a more immersive environment. Enterprise users can bring trainees into a virtual experience that accurately simulates their production line. With custom-built interactive procedures, they can learn how to operate relevant machines seamlessly. This helps them better understand complex concepts and procedures and at a highly accelerated rate, reducing the overall training time needed. In addition, being easily scalable and without incurring any downtime or risk of injury in the process creates an additional benefit to a company’s bottom line.
Sales and marketing can also benefit from metaverse platforms because they allow companies to showcase their products and services more interactively. This can help customers better understand what they are buying and how it works. For example, companies can create jaw-dropping tradeshow experiences and elevate their virtual showrooms to showcase their products in a more immersive way. It’s also perfect for presenting complex products, ideas, or services where the customer needs to see it to believe it.
Onboarding is another great use case for corporate metaverse platforms because they allow new employees to learn about the company culture and values in a more engaging way. It’s perfect for onboarding employees when products and services are complex, technical, and difficult to explain. It’s possible to bring products and services to life by harnessing the power of 3D, immersive storytelling, and integrating videos, presentations, images, and 3D objects, all safe and scalable, to teach how products work. This can help new employees feel more connected to the company and its mission. For example, companies could also use virtual environments to simulate the workplace environment and help new employees get acclimated quicker.
Alex Howland:
The Metaverse creates unique experiences that bring dispersed people more closely together to foster collaboration and build community across all levels of the business. The most prominent examples Virbela is seeing today are the practical use cases that elevate different elements of the employee experience journey – these include anything from staff recruitment, new hire onboarding, employee engagement, learning and development programs, spontaneous meetups and unstructured socialization with colleagues and management that leads to a greater connection to leadership, team collaboration/ideation efforts, team offsites or company-wide corporate events and industry conferences, to name a few. Teams are realizing how spatially-aware computing allows for social cues for complex interactions that can’t be achieved via video collaboration.
Our customers that are living these use cases are all creating healthy, productive, and engaging remote and hybrid work environments while slashing real estate costs, travel costs, and carbon footprints. Other areas that are seeing promise are external sessions such as prospect product demo sessions, customer service sessions or product development.
With a background in behavioural psychology, creating a psychologically safe space has always been a core focus of Virbela – giving everyone a voice and the confidence that perhaps some didn’t have in the physical world. We’ve seen so many communities of like-minded people from all walks of life find comfort and connection in Virbela – it’s been wonderful to see. Companies embracing virtual work environments are also leaving many of the persistent problems of fixed-office arrangements behind. Diversity, inclusion, and equity can be rebuilt from the ground up because individuals work in Virbela in avatar form. This helps eliminate the subtle power plays of appearance or common microaggressions and refocuses teams on merit and achievement. As collaboration quickly becomes comfortable in Virbela, a wider pool of viewpoints can lead to ground-breaking ideas for new products and services while bringing a sense of fun and camaraderie back into daily office life.
Beyond the enterprise, we’ve even seen the platform bring friends and families together for weddings, bar mitzvahs, graduations, etc.
Eventually, Virbela sees virtual spaces replacing the brick-and-mortar office completely for dispersed teams. It will be the hub where people come together to connect, share experiences and build community, and eXp has already shown that there are huge benefits to reap – growing from 1000 to 87,000, expanding to 20+ international markets, voted Glassdoor “Best Places to Work” 5 years in a row.
What are the challenges of implementing Metaverse applications for enterprise end-users?
Mads Troelsgaard:
Understandably, many companies may look to immersive digital experiences to preserve, protect, and optimize their existing business models and help to provide more value for their employees and partners. However, the technology and use case application is at such an early stage in terms of enterprise awareness and know-how that many aspire to explore and implement, but they just don’t know how to yet.
Virtual testing grounds can reduce the cost of designing, building, and operating complex machinery in many industries, and they can be a perfect solution for technical training, especially within industrial and machine manufacturing. However, metaverse technologies can be expensive. It’s costly to invest and develop technologies and software that require special equipment like MR and VR glasses and the infrastructure around these.
In addition to these challenges, there are other factors to consider. For example, if we (as an industry) want widespread adoption of immersive technology, it’s important to ensure that corporate Metaverse applications are user-friendly and easy to navigate.
Another question enterprise users might ask is if these applications and immersive technologies will impact employee productivity. While there’s no doubt that corporate Metaverse applications can provide value through a more immersive and engaging experience for employees, there is also a risk of them creating more of a distraction if not used properly.
Another challenge is investing in the right corporate Metaverse technology and considering how enterprises will integrate corporate Metaverse applications with their existing systems and processes. At SynergyXR, we are fully aware of these barriers and are constantly looking to create an experience that not only creates measurable value for enterprise customers but also simplifies the process at an affordable entry point.
Overall, while there are certainly challenges associated with implementing immersive applications for enterprise end-users, there are also many opportunities. By carefully considering the challenges and opportunities, we believe that enterprises can incorporate corporate Metaverse applications that provide real value to their employees and customers.
Alex Howland:
A key challenge that remains is accessibility. Virbela is desktop-first, making it accessible to mo today, no new and expensive hardware for companies to invest in and for employees to learn. Virbela’s user experience and navigation is designed to be simple to learn and intuitive for any generation. Virbela has always been focused on usability, access, scale and real-world applications in the Metaverse.
Another challenge that remains is resistance to change, fear of the unknown and the stigma that the Metaverse is only for gamers. For some, avatar interaction makes it feel too gamelike, as many who haven’t experienced it don’t fully understand the benefits. The way we work has changed, but the tools and mentality is still yet to catch up.
What are the ethical considerations of using the Metaverse in the enterprise?
Mads Troelsgaard:
As with any new and emerging technology, it’s extremely important to consider ethical considerations and the implications it will or may have. When Metaverse and virtual reality pioneer Tony Parisi published his seven fundamental rules of the Metaverse, it widely matched our vision for the future.
A completely “open” Metaverse is not necessarily what enterprise customers want or need. Instead, they need a collection of virtual experiences tailored to their needs, under their control, and with only those explicitly invited stakeholders. Companies must establish some guardrails and ensure they understand how they should think about the Corporate Metaverse (we have already provided some to consider; The Seven Rules of the Corporate Metaverse).
The main ethical considerations of using corporate Metaverse platforms in an enterprise context mainly encompass privacy, security, and data ownership. Companies will need to ensure that they are protecting their employee and customers’ data and privacy when using Metaverse platforms. They will also need to ensure that their employees are trained to use these platforms safely and securely to protect their intellectual property.
Another potential ethical consideration is accessibility. Companies will need to ensure that their Metaverse platforms are accessible to all users, including those with disabilities. There are also users who don’t necessarily like or want to use an MR or VR headset, as they are prone to motion sickness. It will be important for software platforms to be device agnostic, allowing users to choose alternative interfaces that then match their preferences and physical needs.
Finally, companies will need to consider the impact of Metaverse platforms on their employees’ mental health and well-being. The immersive nature of these platforms could lead to issues like addiction and burnout if not managed properly.
Alex Howland:
Concerns around privacy and security are naturally in question and still being determined. With the use of headsets particularly, there’s the opportunity to collect far more data than before.
Virtual environments are able to enhance culture and a sense of community, trust and happiness at work – at an individual, team and company level. But they shouldn’t be used as a monitoring tool to check on people.
Again, accessibility in the sense of inclusion is an important consideration – Making sure everyone feels comfortable, represented and heard in these new environments. The fact that diversity and inclusion can be rewritten is a huge opportunity for companies to better navigate issues that may have existed in the physical office.
What key factors will determine the success of enterprise Metaverse services?
Mads Troelsgaard:
Let’s face it – the future of the corporate Metaverse is in such an early stage of development that it’s still unknown what the future holds. With that said, it is coming, and executives and managers should prepare by formulating a company metaverse strategy that is flexible enough to adapt to changes in technology and consumer preferences. It’s the kids and youth of today, who will grow up with an innate knowledge of the Metaverse and will be the employees and leaders of the future, so a change is coming, and we had better be prepared.
Companies should adopt a “test and learn” approach for both consumer-facing and enterprise functions. The Metaverse is present today in our everyday lives and has the potential to change life as we know it. Executives need to embrace the technology and software solutions that will enhance their company and create additional value for themselves, their partners, and their customers.
Remote work is both possible and practical for various businesses, and many remote workers have thrived in environments that include the Metaverse. The always-on connectivity of its systems makes the Metaverse persistently available, which, in turn, is making it a part of daily life and business as well as the driver of significant value as a fully functioning economy.
Alex Howland:
The Metaverse is not a means in itself but rather a tool used to drive significant business outcomes – at a team, individual and organizational level. At Virbela, we see the emotional benefits as central. For employees, they feel more connected and happy, with more autonomy in how they work and less zoom fatigue. At a team level, it enables better brainstorming, ideation and cohesion across teams/levels of the business, as well as the ability to more effectively work through conflicts more. And lastly, at an organizational level, it brings ESG initiatives, is a tool to increase retention and efficiencies across the business, enhance training outcomes, enable cost savings and so on. One of our customers is actually conducting a Zoom/Virbela comparison to prove the emotional, social and practical benefits of virtual environments for particular scenarios.
We believe that virtual environments like Virbela will become your office headquarters in the future, and this is already the case for customers like eXp today. But we still recognize that different entry points will have their place. For example, you may use a headset for in-depth training where full immersion is beneficial, opting for desktop 3D experiences for everyday work connections or meetings, and even log in via mobile when you are away from your desk/traveling for example.
With the transition to remote work, organizations are changing how they think about mental health. While mental health attention was once reserved for crises, now it’s more commonplace to provide earlier attention. Supporting the happiness and mental health of workers as they transition to these new platforms will be central to its success.
Diversification of content will also contribute to longer-term success. There needs to be content developer tools that help with workflow. It will become more of a library to be able to self-serve – much like WordPress did for websites. Frame, one of Virbela’s flagship products, is a good example here.
AI integration in the Metaverse will also be key. Frame is using AI to help build a creator economy in the Metaverse.
What are your predictions for the future of the Metaverse in the enterprise?
Mads Troelsgaard:
As for predictions for the future of the corporate Metaverse, we expect it to become more prevalent in the coming years. Various reports indicate by 2025, there will be over 1 billion active users in the Metaverse. As it becomes more available and understood, we only expect this number to rise exponentially. The Metaverse will then also become more integrated into our daily lives and businesses as technology continues to advance.
It has the potential to change how we work, learn, and interact with each other, and at SynergyXR, our goal is to be there to help companies utilize the positive elements of the corporate Metaverse to educate, grow and thrive in this new immersive environment.
Alex Howland:
As I mentioned before, we are already seeing campuses like Virbela’s becoming enterprise headquarters for forward-looking companies who know they must adapt to new working practices. In the near term, we will continue to see more RFPs for metaverse solutions as official budgets and teams are dedicated to the transition. With customized goals and objectives, leaders and innovators are quickly moving beyond the pilot stage to sell this across the business.
Avatars will become a true reflection of who we are and who we want to be and will be central in all forms of communication, not just 3D (Microsoft recently announced avatars for Teams).
In the coming years, we may see a pendulum swing back to virtual events. People were excited to get back to in-person events, but travel and event budgets are a drain, so we will see more creativity in using metaverse platforms for large-scale corporate events. DXC is already saving over $900K in travel, accommodation, and venue costs through their Virbela corporate campus and events, with a 90% employee satisfaction rating.
Being spatially present and “seen” with colleagues again but without the constraints of physical location will lead to a better work-life balance, employee health and happiness both in and out of work.
Immersive collaboration makes companies more transparent, negating the need for remote employee tracking tools and the negative impacts these have on employee trust.
We’ll see individual contributor, management, and executive roles change. Some may disappear as global teams become more efficient. Meanwhile, others will create roles to manage remote work, create communication channels, set new productivity benchmarks, and define culture.
Governments will have multifaceted relationships with the Metaverse. Due to a lax central regulatory environment for Web2, social media has gone from being a great enabler to a pariah of exploiting user data and a channel for manipulating human behavior. Industry leaders and government authorities will need to work together on regulations and privacy controls to be more thoughtful about the value proposition that communities and individuals hold in the Metaverse. The Metaverse will help us realign social norms that are more in line with our physical world – and much less toxic than the social platforms that have come before it.
The Metaverse is the next iteration of the internet but with security. While we will keep talking about “openness” and decentralization for the masses – in the B2B world, it will prioritize privacy and security. Our customers are actually asking for higher-walled gardens as they battle with GDPR and other enterprise compliance issues.
