Mobile Carriers Leading 5G, 'Metaverse' War

A scene from the 'Volumetric Human' performance by K-pop's leading choreographer Lia Kim, produced at SK Telecom Jump Studio. In a virtual futuristic city, multiple holograms of Lia Kim, each wearing different outfits, perform the same dance simultaneously like a cloning technique.
[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Seulgina Cho] The mobile telecommunications industry, armed with ultra-fast 5G communication networks, has entered the so-called "Metaverse (3D virtual world)" war. Telecom companies, viewing the metaverse?which encompasses both reality and virtuality?as a new growth engine, are launching various content and services utilizing augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) alongside building metaverse platforms. Especially among the digitally savvy MZ generation, the response has been strong, leading to evaluations that the metaverse era becoming a part of everyday life is not far off.

According to the telecommunications industry on the 16th, the three major telecom companies?SK Telecom, KT, and LG Uplus?are recently expanding AR and VR services while building metaverse platforms using their own 5G networks. The term "metaverse," first introduced in Neal Stephenson's 1992 novel, refers to a 3D virtual world where the boundaries between reality and virtuality disappear. Recently, it has become a symbolic theme of the COVID-19 era, fueled by the popularity of the U.S. gaming platform "Roblox," which approaches 40 million daily users, and its New York Stock Exchange listing.

◇Three Major Telecom Companies "Capture the Metaverse Market"

SK Telecom, which emphasized its commitment to building a metaverse platform by establishing a Mixed Reality (MR) Service Company (CO) in its organizational restructuring at the end of last year, plans to significantly upgrade its VR-based social communication service, Virtual Meetup, around this summer. This move aims to swiftly secure a leading position in the rapidly growing metaverse market.

SK Telecom's metaverse content, such as the volumetric technology-applied doppelganger performance by choreographer Lia Kim, has surpassed 1.25 million monthly active users (MAU) as of early this month. The entrance ceremony of Soonchunhyang University, conducted by SK Telecom earlier this month, was held as the world's first metaverse entrance ceremony, where freshmen attended as avatars in a VR-implemented campus, drawing significant attention.

LG Uplus unveils VR content 'Space Adventurers: Space Station Experience'

KT is also continuously introducing services that incorporate AR and VR into daily life, such as the "AR Showroom," which implements products broadcast on TV home shopping channels as 3D content on mobile and TV screens. The VR language training program through the virtual meeting platform "Engage" allows users to take daily conversation classes with native English instructors in avatar form within a virtual space.

LG Uplus is expanding the metaverse market through the XR Alliance, a 5G content consortium for which it serves as chair. The first project, which allows vivid VR viewing of the daily life of astronauts working on the International Space Station (ISS), will have its Episode 2 simultaneously released worldwide this month. LG Uplus is also planning to create short AR and VR versions of key scenes from popular dramas and movies in the future.

◇Next-Generation Platform is the Metaverse

Not only telecom companies but also domestic and international ICT companies regard the metaverse as the next-generation computing platform succeeding mobile. Beyond games represented by Roblox, it is explained that all areas of daily life, including hobbies, work, and livelihood, will enter the metaverse.

Market research firm Strategy Analytics (SA) estimates that the metaverse market will grow rapidly from this year, with related revenues reaching $280 billion (approximately 315 trillion KRW) by 2025. An industry insider said, "The metaverse market is just beginning," adding, "The real metaverse war is starting among domestic companies as well." Global big tech companies such as Microsoft (MS) and Facebook have already prepared to secure the market by acquiring related companies early and developing AR and VR devices.

The majority of users who have quickly embraced the metaverse are from the MZ generation. The spread of non-face-to-face (untact) interactions due to COVID-19 has accelerated this trend. It has been confirmed that American teenagers spend 2.5 times more time on Roblox than on YouTube, and Roblox users tripled compared to the previous year. In Korea, Zepeto is representative. Naver Z's Zepeto, featuring 3D avatars, surpassed 200 million cumulative users last month.