How to tell if your metaverse provider is just wearing new clothes

Metaverse mania is leading service providers to re-label established capabilities in the name of the latest fashion.

Whether it is Accenture and its Metaverse Continuum of enterprise services, Tech Mahindra and its TechMVerse, Infosys and its Metaverse Foundry, or any other metaverse-labeled service provider’s capability, enterprise leaders must tread carefully through the baffling buzzwords to ensure they get the expertise they need among the emperors trying on new clothes.

Capgemini is the latest to put a flag in the shifting sands of the metaverse, upgrading a long-standing working relationship with 3D-content specialist Unity to a “global alliance partnership.” Capgemini and Unity have a track record of delivering interactive applications. For example, they worked together to allow sales teams to visualize shelf-space layouts in 3D and on an immersive training experience for a fire-fighting vehicle maker.

Without Web3, immersive experiences are not metaverse

Both are great cases of creating immersive experiences with virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR). But Capgemini says the intent is to help enterprises “leverage the business value of immersive and metaverse experiences.” They may well create a virtual space where users can interact with a computer-generated environment and other users via digital versions of themselves. But our view is that the metaverse is more than an immersive experience. It is the experience layer of Web3, built with blockchain and delivering data ownership into the hands of users. Any part of it should also be interoperable with the rest of the metaverse.

These distinctions are important because while there is immense value in 3D immersive environments for customer and employee experiences, delivering these is very different from the requirement to rethink the business models and ways of working the rise of Web3 will force upon us. Read the HFS Point of View, How Web3 will finally deliver the internet’s promise of democratized experiences.

Look to professional services to help you find new value in Web3

Capgemini’s partnership with Unity will focus on defining and executing sector-specific solutions and professional services to deliver tailored platforms for enterprise clients, defining methodologies, conducting joint R&D, working together on business and solution development, and scaling up certified talent in the use of Unity’s real-time 3D technology.

The professional services part of this is key because this is where the focus on new business models and ways of working in response to the constraints of Web3 must happen.

Exhibit 1: Web3 competencies, technologies, and outcomes: the metaverse is the experience layer

Source: HFS Research, 2022

The Bottom Line: For tactical enhancements to CX and EX, stick with experts in immersion. For a strategic step into a new paradigm, seek Web3 competencies.

If it is simple and tactical customer experience (CX) and employee experience (EX) enhancement you want, expertise in AR and VR will meet your needs. If you also have a strategic intent to understand and align your business to the new paradigm of Web3, look for expertise in blockchain, cloud computing, ecosystem building, new business models, and the rest of the range of technologies and capabilities laid out in Exhibit 1.

For more guidance, see our forthcoming POV The Metaverse does not yet exist – here’s what you are being sold in its name.