Enterprise Metaverse Implications for the Workplace, Virtual Events, Retail, and More

The buildup of the metaverse has brought about a variety of opinions among industry leaders. However, this shouldn’t be surprising since this is such a new space and we don’t have any historical insights to draw from. With the metaverse, enterprises and consumers can completely change the way they interact with content and services, ranging from 3D hybrid workspaces to virtual concerts. However, the enterprise segment is seen as the surer bet right now because the value is conveyed more clearly. Key aspects of the enterprise metaverse include standardization, digital twins/simulations, immersive collaboration, as well as marketing, sales, and customer service.

Market Overview

• Enterprise market revenue from immersive collaboration and digital twin/simulations will reach US$58.9 billion by 2030, growing at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 21.5% between 2021 and 2030. Digital twins and simulations generate significantly more revenue than immersive collaboration, partly due to the former’s market maturity.
• North America accounts for just over half of the US$1.1 billion in global revenue in immersive collaboration and related cloud services. In 2030, the region will still be the biggest market opportunity, although the rest of the world will catch up significantly. That year, the US$8.1 billion in immersive collaboration revenue in North America will comprise a little over a third of global revenue (US$22.3 billion).
• The year 2025 will mark the beginning of more widespread immersive collaboration usage as Augmented Reality (AR)/Virtual Reality (VR) devices become more mainstream and accepted in 3D workflows.
• Digital twin and simulation revenue, spurred by improved accessibility and interoperability in the industrial metaverse, is going to grow at a CAGR of 16.7% between 2021 and 2030—reaching a total of US$36.6 billion in the decade’s last year. North America, Western Europe, and Asia-Pacific will be relatively similar in terms of market potential throughout the forecast period, with North America leading the way.

“The ideal version of the metaverse transcends the consumer and enterprise markets and would establish a relatively unified and cohesive foundation for all aspects of communication, workflows, and economies.” - Michael Inouye, Principal Analyst at ABI Research

Key Decision Items

Interoperability Is Key to Stimulating the Fragmented Enterprise Metaverse Market  

Unlike the consumer metaverse, where the market is essentially an oligopoly, the enterprise segment is more splintered. That’s because some companies in the enterprise space specialize in certain areas, with each area having its own standards and regulations. Therefore, there’s a growing need for interoperability in enterprise use cases to enable a seamless workflow.

Enterprise metaverse providers should look at NVIDIA’s Omniverse, for example. Omniverse uses the Universal Scene Description (USD) framework to accelerate the development time of 3D pipelines and large-scale virtual world simulations. One of the key benefits of USD is that it allows applications to work in parallel—reducing the repetitive and sequential steps required in previous workflows.

The key to creating a more interoperable environment will be standardization, both industry-specific and for the broader market. Influential to making this happen are organizations like the Metaverse Standards Forum (MSF), which recently admitted the Digital Twin Consortium as a leading member. With more than 1,000 companies and organizations having already joined MSF since its June 2022 launch, the forum is focused on identifying which metaverse standards need to be put in place. It’s up to the members to actually create the standards.

Digital Twin and Simulation Software Unlock the Industrial Metaverse

Digital twins, conjoined with Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT), are a cornerstone of the industrial metaverse. These technologies allow users to pull real-time data on virtual replicas of a physical object, machine, person, or process—and simulate different scenarios/experiment with new ideas. With sensors and real-time insight increasingly finding their way into large-scale deployments for sustainability and improving operational efficiency, solution providers should make digital twin applications integral to metaverse product offerings.

In terms of barriers, the main constraint in digital twin adoption is a lack of expertise. To make the technology more welcoming to newcomers, the market must work toward improved accessibility and interoperability, as pointed out previously. With a more interlinked ecosystem, companies at various phases of digital transformation will find digital twins for the metaverse less intimidating. Adding to this, there is ample opportunity for professional services to guide early-stage clients.

Focusing on Immersive Where it is Most Effective Today

Immersive, in the context of the enterprise metaverse, refers to experiences (content, services, application-driven), tools/solutions, or devices that produce interactivity and/or sensory stimuli in virtual environments, notably the workplace. It’s part of the greater Collaboration and Communication (C&C) space. Using Head-Mounted Displays (HMDS), smartphone devices, tablets, etc., immersive platforms enable the merging of the real and virtual worlds—greatly important for collaboration between in-office workers and remote workers, or fully remote teams. Some platforms include enhanced whiteboarding features (e.g., watch audience gazes), physical representations of a building, and 3D virtual event hosting—all important factors for collaboration (e.g., video conferencing), training, teaching, and sales/marketing.

Currently, the immersive space is immature, so solution providers and enterprises with metaverse aspirations should just focus on the areas where the technology already shines—training, collaboration, design for pre-existing 3D workflows, and HR (e.g., onboarding, interviews, demonstrating company culture). Between the return to in-office work and the fact that immersive device adoption is still low, this area has some ambiguity when it comes to growth expectations. It’s best to build upon these proven areas before expanding to brand new immersive use cases in the enterprise.

Look at Retail from a Marketing Lens

Retailers should view the metaverse through a marketing lens as opposed to a full-fledged channel. At least not until more development and interest are seen in the consumer space. A highly restrictive regulatory environment for Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) makes Web3 and crypto in the metaverse a gamble at this time. Instead, Web3 should be seen as a potential component of the metaverse, not essential. While trials and experimentation with Web3 are certainly justified, the marketing and advertising angle is, as of now, serving as the most promising approach in the consumer metaverse.

As a word of advice, brands and retailers wanting to enter the metaverse market are better off teaming up with companies that can strike a balance between pre-existing best practices and fresh ideas. This is preferable to partnering with Web3-only firms, which brings a distorted view of the market and will hinder marketing and advertising abilities in the long term. Once smart Augmented Reality (AR) glasses go mainstream (2025 estimates), virtual shopping experiences will too. Then, retailers can enable customer representatives to communicate with customers virtually, letting the representative show off a product or interact with it in a 3D space.

With AI/ML “Digital Humans”, Retailers Can Conserve Resources while Improving Customer Experience

AI and Machine Learning (ML) ought to be considered direct enablers of some of the most exciting consumer metaverse use cases. Indeed, solution providers should communicate their product (s) as the key ingredient (s) to improving customer service in the hybrid world. Digital humans, which replace traditional chatbots and Frequently Asked Questions (FQAs), have come a long way. With AI and ML algorithms, more advanced digital avatars can assist virtual shoppers in a much more personalized manner and can even change facial gestures based on a conversational tone.

Moreover, platforms like the one from UneeQ make the conversations feel life-like by incorporating Natural language Processing (NPL) and by letting customers choose a set of skillsets and personality traits for the digital human before engagement. Plus, many AI platforms remember names, recognize voices, and direct customers to the most suitable promotion material, all while keeping regulation and user privacy in mind. These AI/ML technologies are expected to expand to more complex customer service applications, compared to the early stage customer engagements (e.g., help windows, FAQs) that they are predominantly used for now. For the company that takes advantage of these AI-enabled metaverse platforms, resources can be reallocated to other business areas and customers will appreciate the more consistent customer experience.

Key Market Players to Watch

• Amazon Web Services (AWS)
• Apple
• Autodesk
• Google
• Meta
• Microsoft
• NVIDIA
• Siemens
• TechSparq
• Touchcast
• UneeQ
• Virbela

Dig Deeper for the Full Picture

To learn more about how the opportunities in the metaverse—for both innovation leaders and HR/IT managers who are interested—download ABI Research’s Evaluation of the Enterprise Metaverse Opportunity research report.

Not ready for the report yet? Check out our Live E-Commerce to Be a Key Factor in Next-Generation (Low Latency) Video Research Highlight.  This content is part of the company’s Metaverse & Technologies Research Service.