Cyril Yeung
- Dec 6, 2022
- 3 min read

What is Metaverse Economy? Capture the Metaverse opportunities through A-D-E-N?

Written By: Dr. Amanda Lim and Dr. Kyle Wong

While the average global economy only experiences low single digit percentage growth rate, Metaverse related market size is projected to enjoy a high double digits percentage growth in the coming years. According to Emergen Research, the global Metaverse market size is USD 47.69 Billion in 2020. It is estimated to reach USD 828.95 Billion in 2028. (1) Metaverse is considered as a virtual world by people where characters can interact with each other. Can we define Metaverse Economy as the economic activities happening in and related to the metaverse?

Can we capture the growth of the Metaverse Economy for our own business growth?

Metaverse is a virtual ecosystem where users can interact, experience, transact and generate values together (2). Economy is defined to be the state of a country or region in terms of the production and consumption of goods and services and the supply of money (3). As there is currently no universal definition for Metaverse Economy, we may try to define it from the understanding of Digital Economy. Digital Economy is defined as the economic activity that results from billions of everyday online connections among people, businesses, devices, data, and processes (4). The key technology enablers of Metaverse include cryptocurrency, 5G, VR/AR and IoTs . Accordingly, Metaverse Economy can be defined as the economic activities that result from the growing virtual ecosystem or virtual world where the people interact, experience, and add value for the growth of the virtual ecosystem. These metaverse economic activities drive production and consumption of goods and services in both virtual and real worlds.

How many active users are there in the virtual ecosystem? We may not have a definite answer. However, the number is huge if we estimate that from the number of active users participating in the existing large Metaverse platforms:

Ø Meta has 3.6B active monthly Facebook users (5)

Ø Minecraft has 141M non-China users (6) & Minecraft China has 400M users (7)

Ø Roblox has 202M monthly users (8)

Ø Sandbox has 500k connected wallets (9)

Ø Fortnite has 80.4M monthly active users (10)

Ø Decentraland has 300K monthly active users (11)

Owing to the travel restrictions during the pandemic, a lot of people cannot leave their hometown in the past two years. Having a virtual vacation using Meta’s Oculus may be an attractive alternative option! Instead of wearing face masks and following social distancing rules in the real world, friends may choose to hang out in Fortnite, Sandbox or Decentraland. A lot of students, being forced to stay home to have Zoom lessons, are already playing with classmates in Roblox and Minecraft. All these platforms support players‘ created 3D contents, allowing players to interact and communicate so they can enjoy things togethers. Staying and immersing in a Metaverse platform is like having a second life. One can have freedom to choose one’s identity. You can be forever young, have another gender, speak multiple languages, and have superpowers! Wah! It looks super amazing. Can we also run and bring our business inside the Metaverse? Driven by technology and ecosystem investments by the Metaverse players, the day to work in metaverse may be coming soon!

To prepare for the metaverse age and opportunities to come, companies may need to be better equipped for the hybrid mode (virtual and real) of business! Are you prepared for your A-D-E-N? (A = Avatars, D = 3D Digital Contents, E = Hybrid Events, N = NFTs)

A= Avatars: Time to design your own avatar and hire avatars staff. Your avatar can be forever young and look great. An avatar staff can be your KOL or customer support representative who can speak multiple languages, work 7x24 and be present in multiple places.

D = 3D Digital Contents: Time to design your workplace in a more spacious environment and design your showroom in a more elegant way! Your colleagues and clients can arrive at your virtual office and showroom anytime anywhere from the real world.

E = Hybrid Events: Time to have more of your company events in hybrid (virtual and real) mode where social distancing will not be a stopper for your planned long campaigns! You can get better engagements with partners or clients worldwide and get a better ESG score by having company events in hybrid mode.

N = NFTs: Time to have your NFTs products! As big brands are starting to create and sell their NFTs, it means that NFTs can be new and good revenue streams for companies.

Have you prepared for A-D-E-N? If not, start it now! If yes, let’s get more business together riding on the booming metaverse opportunities!