Global metaverse revenue grew 6.2% in 2023 as demands for products pick up steam: S&P Global Market Intelligence

Global metaverse revenue grew 6.2 per cent year on year to an estimated USD 19.26 billion in 2023 as core products around gaming and workflow digitization continued to pick up steam, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence.

While the recent rise in spending is no match for the heady growth rates of revenue from metaverse products, but according to financial information and analytics firm is a recovery from the segment's 2.7 per cent slip in 2022.

Revenue trends in 2023 already reflect that dynamic, and the growing list of companies leaning into the metaverse in 2024 underlines the growing opportunity, according to the report.

"Consumer facing experiences received a boost with Disney investing with Epic, and Apple entered the virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and spatial ecosystem with its Vision Pro headset," Ian Hughes, senior research analyst at S&P Global Market Intelligence said.

By definition, the metaverse is a 3D digital space that uses virtual reality, augmented reality, and other technologies to enable lifelike experiences.

In a report, the analytics firm said commercial software and services from vendors, such as Accenture and Siemens, grew 13 per cent in 2023.

However, revenue growth began to slow in the final quarter of the year, suggesting there may be some friction around new sales opportunities.

Metaverse interface hardware fell 3.0 per cent year-on-year to USD 5.27 billion in 2023 as consumers lost interest in a fleet of aging headsets. New offerings from Meta and Apple give the segment room to grow in 2024, it noted.

"With a focus on artificial intelligence (AI) across the board, some have suggested the metaverse is dead, but the direction of travel in the evolution of all digital interaction continues to evolve towards a metaverse future," said Hughes.

"Revenue trends in 2023 already reflect that dynamic, and the growing list of companies leaning into the metaverse in 2024 underlines the growing opportunity. Consumer facing experiences received a boost with Disney investing with Epic, and Apple entered the virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and spatial ecosystem with its Vision Pro headset," the analyst said.

"However, the less quirky, more engineering robust world of manufacturing continues to advance as companies, such as Siemens's ongoing partnership with Nvidia, create industrial metaverse applications."

Metaverse looks to gain significant savings and improvements as they evolve from industrial IoT to digital twins into an AI enhanced virtual, simulation and robotics powered future, where many technical trends come together. 

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