Corporate giants JP Morgan, CBRE and Accenture have established corporate outposts in the metaverse, but one of the industry’s biggest developers thinks virtual offices are a waste of time.
Janine Yorio, chief executive of metaverse developer and investment fund Everyrealm, told Financial News that most metaverse workspaces are part of “marketing efforts” and lack “a clear path to utility.”
“When [companies] build an office in the metaverse… they don’t really know why people would come, but they think they should because the metaverse is a trending topic. There are a lot of offices sitting out there in several different metaverses and nobody visits them.”
“A lot of companies have done that,” he said. “The truth is, no one cares.”
The Everyrealm boss believes that the real estate in the metaverse has significant potential, but is better suited for play, not work, with casinos and gaming environments taking center stage.
Yorio said, “We can barely get people to come to the office in real life. Why would people want to spend time pretending to be there?”
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The metaverse is a collection of 24/7 worlds hosted online. In many of them, people use cryptocurrencies to buy and sell virtual land. Some use virtual reality headsets to allow people to interact with each other as if they were actually there.
Citi recently estimated that by the end of the decade the sector could represent a $13 trillion revenue opportunitywith five billion people using it.
Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, has invested heavily in the concept and last year launched its Horizon Workrooms product, which allows people to hold business meetings in virtual reality office rooms.
Consulting giant Accenture is also running training sessions in a virtual reality workspace known as Nth Floor, while real estate agency CBRE is also trialling a metaverse office.
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Everyrealm acts as the owner. Buy and develop metaverse real estate, including the virtual plot where JP Morgan set up its first digital branch in 2021. The space features a spiral staircase, a live tiger and an illuminated portrait of the bank’s crypto-skeptic CEO Jamie demon
JP Morgan declined to comment on Yorio’s statements.
Venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz led a $60 million Series A funding round in Everyrealm earlier this year.
Yorio’s comments come after billionaire cryptocurrency enthusiast Mark Cuban told YouTube channel Altcoin Daily that buying virtual real estate is “the dumbest shit ever.”
To contact the author of this story with comments or news, email Alex Daniel
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