Tim Sweeney, Chief Executive Officer of Epic Games Inc, said at a recent event this week the Metaverse could offer massive potential to the global economy.
Sweeney, whose company has created hit games as Fortnite, Gears of War, and Unreal Tournament, currently holds a huge online community for users as well as virtual concerts, Bloomberg reported.
The chief executive said at a conference in Seoul, South Korea the Metaverse had the “potential to become a multitrillion-dollar part of the world economy” over the next few decades.
In an interview on the sidelines of his speech, quoted by Bloomberg, he explained further,
“The next three years are going to be critical for all of the metaverse-aspiring companies like Epic, Roblox, Microsoft, Facebook. It’s kind of a race to get to a billion users, whoever brings on a billion users first, would be the presumed leader in setting the standards”
He concluded in a comment: “The metaverse is a term like the internet. No company can own it.”
According to the report, Epic’s chief executive plans to expand Fortnite to a Metaverse solution with the potential to attract up to a billion users in the near future, as well as work with Unreal Engine to enable global firms to “have a real-time 3D presence.”
He added the firm would “build one set of digital assets that can be deployed to film and television and in real-time games, scaling from high-end consoles down to low-end smartphones,” and would continue to collaborate with device manufacturers to expand access to the successor to the Internet.
Epic’s CEO Slams Apple and Google, Urges Open-Source Development
The news comes as the CEO slammed rival tech firms such as Apple and Google for developing proprietary solutions such as app stores and payment systems, which he alleges were partly motivated by competition over building the Metaverse rather than creating an open-source platform.
At the Global Conference for Mobile Application Ecosystem Fairness event as reported by BNN Bloomberg, he stated Apple had locked a billion users “into one store and payment processor, adding,
“Now Apple complies with oppressive foreign laws, which surveil users and deprive them of political rights. But Apple is ignoring laws passed by Korea’s democracy. Apple must be stopped”
Continuing his scathing comments, he blasted Google’s fees on payments it did not process as “crazy” and vowed to “stand up against these monopolies. I’m proud to stand with you and say I’m a Korean.”
He concluded his comments, he vowed to stand up “against these monopolies” and said he was “proud to stand with you and say I’m a Korean.”
Further Comments on the Metaverse
The comments come after Orlando Bravo, Co-Founder and Managing Partner to Thoma Bravo, a private equity firm, lauded the Metaverse as a “big time” investment opportunity in 2021.
“It’s investable and it’s going to be very big. The metaverse is the next frontier just like social networking was when we got started,” he told CNBC’s Annette Weisbach in a recent interview.
The statements come just weeks after Mark Zuckerberg, CEO and Founder of Meta, shocked global audiences after he revealed Facebook’s rebrand at the Connect event in late October.
Rival tech giants such as NVIDIA, Microsoft, HTC VIVE, Roblox, and many others have begun launching competing platforms and technologies in a bid to expand market shares across the Metaverse.
