At Shinhan Financial Management Meeting
Introducing Related Books to Employees
President Lim Young-jin Orders Market Monitoring
[Asia Economy Reporter Ki Ha-young] As competition between the card industry and big tech (large information and communication companies) intensifies beyond industry boundaries, Shinhan Card, the industry leader, has rolled up its sleeves to discover future growth engines.
According to the card industry on the 16th, Shinhan Card CEO Lim Young-jin recently instructed to continuously monitor the metaverse market and devise ways to secure a leading position in order to acquire future customers. In response, the management team has begun full-scale metaverse studies. The metaverse is a compound word of meta, meaning transcendence or virtual, and universe, meaning the real world, referring to a three-dimensional virtual world. It is a more advanced concept than existing virtual reality (VR), operating based on a three-dimensional virtual world that transcends reality.
Earlier, on the 10th, the book "Metaverse" was introduced at the Shinhan Financial Group management meeting called the '3rd Line Session' and disseminated to affiliate employees. In particular, a review of the augmented reality (AR) avatar service "Zepeto" was posted on Shinhan Card's internal bulletin board, drawing high interest from employees. A manager-level employee working at Shinhan Card headquarters shared their experience with colleagues after creating a character, entering a shop, virtually trying on products, and meeting and communicating with other users.
Since the spread of COVID-19 and the activation of the non-face-to-face economy due to social distancing, the metaverse market has been rapidly growing. Representative platforms include the U.S. gaming platform "Roblox" and Naver's "Zepeto." They especially enjoy overwhelming support from Generation Z, the future customers. In the U.S., 55% of youths under 16 are registered on Roblox, with nearly 40 million daily active users. Last year, its revenue surpassed 1 trillion won, and it recently went public on the New York Stock Exchange. Zepeto also has over 200 million global users, with 90% being overseas users and 80% in their teens. Market research firm Strategy Analytics forecasts that the metaverse market, represented by VR and AR, will grow to $280 billion (approximately 314 trillion won) by 2025, more than six times the current size.
Shinhan Card is reviewing various metaverse business linkage models, including implementing franchise stores favored by teenagers and people in their twenties within the metaverse and marketing that matches customers to these stores.
A Shinhan Card official said, "We see this as a huge turning point where the boundary between reality and virtual collapses," adding, "We will continue to explore ways to integrate card business in a world where humans and artificial intelligence (AI) coexist."
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