Crunchbase's VCs Will Spend Billions More To Make The Metaverse A Reality covers the growing amounts of venture capital going to companies involved in the metaverse.
For those not familiar with the metaverse, here's how Crunchbase describes it:
While still a fairly nebulous concept, the metaverse is, broadly speaking, viewed by many as the next phase of the internet, where online experiences will combine to form something of an immersive virtual experience. It combines virtual reality, augmented reality, gaming, and other digital social experiences into 3D virtual worlds.
According to the article, metaverse related companies "have raised nearly $10.4 billion so far this year across 612 deals". This is up from $5.9 billion over the same period last year.
This year's funding falls into 4 broad categories
- Gaming: about $7.5 billion (382 rounds)
- Online Games: about $2.5 billion (110 rounds)
- Augmented Reality: about $2.1 billion (176 rounds)
- Virtual worlds: $62.8 million (9 rounds)
Not included in these numbers are investments in crypto and blockchain.
These technologies aren't specific to the metaverse. But they provide much of the technology underpinnings that enable many of the features being promised by metaverse proponents - especially in the areas of commerce and persistent identities.
The high level of VC metaverse investments - coupled with the large investments being made by the big tech companies - means the metaverse will, in some form, continue to grow and likely become very, very big.
Our article The Metaverse is Coming provides more information on this topic.
