MetaVRse is the XR engine for enterprise

Hello Alan, introduce yourself to my readers!

My name is Alan Smithson, CEO of MetaVRse and the Host of the XR For Business Podcast.  I have been working in the immersive space since 2015 and my personal vision is to inspire and educate people to think and act in a socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable way.  I work with my wife and partner, Julie Smithson, Host of the XR For Learning Podcast and a team of incredibly talented developers, artists and business minds including; Alex Colgan, VP Marketing (formerly Ultraleap); Jonathan Moss, Chief Commercial Officer (formerly Sprint); Paul Konieczny, Chief Product Officer; Walid Abdelaty, Chief Technical Officer; and Sergei Sachkov, VP of R&D (formerly Intel).

Can you tell us something more about your company MetaVRse and your just released engine?

We believe that the easier it is to create 3D and XR experiences, the more prolific this technology will become.  MetaVRse is a universal 3D creation platform built on an ultra-efficient rendering core to enable photorealistic immersive experiences available on over 7.5 billion devices.  MetaVRse is a no-code/low-code solution that introduces the concept of ‘visual code snippets’ so that anyone can use it to create powerful experiences while never touching a line of code – marketers, trainers, salespeople, web developers, e-commerce specialists, students, teachers, anyone. Naturally, anyone who wants to code can access in-editor vanilla JavaScript and create their own!

Our mission is to unlock the power of spatial computing for everyone.

Since we’re focused on value creation in the enterprise and education space, Charlie Fink from Forbes described us as “a new 3D game engine that means business“.

The MetaVRse Engine was released on June 1, 2020, at Augmented World Expo (AWE).  Over the past 65 days, we have signed over a thousand registered users with more than 2000 published experiences, which is significantly more than anticipated. The demand for easy-to-use 3D creation tools is growing rapidly as demonstrated by a report by Hired that showed demand for VR/AR engineers grew by 1400% in 2019.

What features are supported?

All of our features are listed on our Features & Roadmap page on our site.  We have our main roadmap listed by quarter, but we typically work in 30-day sprints.  Many commonly asked questions appear in our robust and growing FAQ Page.  

Here are some of our key features of the MetaVRse Engine:

• Format Support (full list): PNG, JPEG, HDR (for skyboxes), FBX, and OBJ. MPEG4 and GLTF/USDZ support coming soon.
• Vanilla JavaScript: enabled within the MetaVRse web editor allowing direct scripting and code snippet development.
• MetaVRse One App: Our unique One App solution unlocks Augmented Reality by installing a small utility application (16mb).  The app is universal and opens AR experiences directly from the web.  With the One App, creators have access to the full power of ARCore and ARKit for the best possible AR experiences.  (Apple Store) (Play Store)

The platform itself is built on C++, but leverages JavaScript scripting within the editor to unlock the power of 3D over the web. We’re prioritizing ease-of-use following the 90/10 rule.  We want to make this platform universally accessible to everyone, so we have focused on lowering the barrier to entry for new users, while maintaining the full power of the engine for power users.  The bridge between the two will be through our marketplace that will allow coders and builders to share and sell their templates and code snippets.  The Marketplace will launch in 2021.

For what AR and VR devices can it export to?

Currently, we’re focused on the 7.5B devices that support 3D over the web.  This represents a 500x larger install base than all AR glasses and head-worn devices combined.  We believe that human-computer interaction will go from phone to face in the next 3-5 years and the path to mass adoption will lie in easy and ubiquitous content creation. We’re currently speaking with VR HMD and AR glasses manufacturers to provide a direct publish feature to their platforms via the web. This is scheduled for a Q4 release.

With other game engines already available, both on standalone (Unity, UE4) and web (Sumerian), why did you feel the need to create a new one?

Unity and Unreal are both incredible game engines and both require specialized training and/or teams to develop for.  We are going after a much larger market of marketing, design, training, sales, and e-commerce professionals who want to leverage next-generation 3D without having to learn complex programming and coding.  

Here is what one user had to say about the subject:

Using MetaVRse is 3 times faster and 2 times simpler than using Unity

Sikaar Keita, Co-founder of Oracle’s XR Lab

We are web and mobile-first, so performance on our engine is paramount.  Recently, we just pushed a test with over 1.5m polygons with 4k textures real-time running on the web on a phone. The graphical fidelity we are achieving on mobile architectures is absolutely incredible, this is some of the secret sauce that makes the MetaVRse Engine so special. You can try our Solar System Learning Experience here and check it by yourself.

As for Sumerian, it is quite complex with a long learning curve. It feels abandoned in the overall Amazon ecosystem and the rendering technology is older and inefficient.  The interesting thing is that most other game engines have been acquired by larger players: Apple (Metaio), Amazon Sumerian (Goo), Snap (Playcanvas), Box (Verold)… there will be others as each large organization strives to build their walled-garden version of the Metaverse. 

We feel that the more universal we make the platform, the more valuable it will become, which is why we offer something that no other engine offers: cloud-hosting and on-premises hosting. This means we can build the entire rendering tech stack into our clients’ hosting systems, eliminating security concerns, and making it easier for organizations to leverage XR.

In what do you think that your engine is better than the competition?

I would say our greatest strength is the ability to learn the platform and create value quickly.  Because of this, we will soon be announcing several partnerships with universities and colleges that will be using the MetaVRse Engine to teach the fundamentals of 3D and allow them to create and share immersive experiences immediately.  Some of the main product features that set the MetaVRse Engine apart from others are:

• Web-Based End-to-End Solution. The MetaVRse Web Editor integrates with our cloud hosting service and empowers users to easily create and publish interactive 3D & XR experiences to all audiences.
• Build Once, Deploy Everywhere. The MetaVRse Engine runs on our proprietary, ultra-efficient 3D rendering core. Designed as a mobile-first architecture, it empowers life-like experiences on all devices.
• OS, Browser & Device Agnostic. Our powerful rendering technology empowers businesses to maximize reach while simplifying 3D and XR content creation, curation, and consumption.
• Low Code / No Code Solution. Build, share, and import easy-to-use templates and code-snippets.  Anyone can build without coding
• Advanced Capabilities with Javascript. In-editor VanillaJS support gives developers more robust under-the-hood capabilities.
• Synchronous Communication. Remote and distributed teams can easily collaborate and communicate with the MetaVRse Engine’s real-time communications.

Here are some quotes from industry leaders about our platform;

“The MetaVRse Engine is an important new tool in the no code movement…it enables all of us to create high quality interactive  3D experiences” – Terry Schussler, Sr. Director of Spatial Computing, Deutsche Telekom

“Eliminating the barrier to entry for 3D and XR – a critical step for industry adoption and scaling” Travis May, Director Technology & Innovation – MasterCard

“MetaVRse is definitely moving in the right direction with no-code/low-code technology and putting 3D/VR creation in the hands of everyone” Brenda Chia, SVP – Creative Director HBO

You say that this is an engine for ENTERPRISE. In what an engine for enterprise and an engine for creators differ?

First of all, you won’t see any games on our platform. Not that we don’t allow them, we simply focus on enterprise value creation through XR and spatial computing.

Second, we offer a completely cloud-based solution, so clients can access our editor, viewer, and analytics dashboard from any device, anywhere. 

Third, we offer on-premise, white label hosting.  This feature allows organizations with sensitive information, security, and data concerns to have full autonomy to use our technology.

Finally, our system is truly universal, working on all operating systems, browsers and devices opening up the world of 3D and XR to anyone anywhere.

What are the current customers of the MetaVRse engine? And some use cases?

We launched the platform on June 1st, 2020 and since then we have created several incredible showcase experiences to help inspire our customers to build solutions in retail, e-commerce, real estate, construction, and education.  

We recently featured one of our customers, Sikaar Keita from Oracle’s XR Lab, showing how he connected our system to the Oracle Infinity business intelligence tool to collect unprecedented data analytics about customer behaviour.  He also connected an IoT sensor real-time to a 3D TIE fighter.  

I’ve tried your engine and it seems a bit heavy to load in some contexts… are you going to fix this? And what other features are you going to implement in the short and medium-term?

Loading and performance times are our first priority and we just completed a development sprint that saw a 2x improvement on load times and major improvements on GPU usage for Android and iOS.  I suggest you try the new version as it is vastly improved over the release version from 2 months ago. 

Here are two recent platform updates:

June 30, 2020 – WebSocket Support, 2x rendering speeds, Search in Editor, New customer automated onboarding, Helper videos, Bug fixes and more…

August 3, 2020 – Major performance improvements, Visual Code Snippets, Downsized code, Drag-and-drop objects into the viewer, Properties menu for assets, Various UI improvements.

NOTE:  All features and live roadmap can be found at: https://metavrse.com/features/ 

What is the price of the MetaVRse engine and how can people access it?

The full feature MetaVRse platform is available free by registering at: https://Engine.MetaVRse.com. 

Our paid tiers include the following benefits:

• Private Links
• Increased Storage
• Increased Number of Projects and Number of Monthly Views
• Custom Branding
• Analytics and Reporting

You have worked on this for 4  years… what are the biggest difficulties that you have found and how have you solved it?

The biggest challenge has been market adoption.  Many organizations jumped on the VR/AR bandwagon only to realize this was a costly, time-consuming endeavor requiring specialized teams and skills.  Many have since scaled back their efforts.  Our focus is really on educating the market to understand the potential return on investment (ROI) and drive immediate results with as few resources as possible.  

On the technical side, the core rendering technology was built for mobile architectures as a way to put 3D graphics into lane-level navigation on top of vector maps which explains why it uses the device processing so efficiently to enable photorealistic 3D experiences delivered over the web, real-time.  Then to take this technology and make it easy and accessible to everyone through a well planned, human-centric UX was definitely a challenging, but rewarding experience.  

By making the creation of 3D and XR available to everyone, while expediting the time to value and reducing the time/skill required to build immersive experiences, we believe that the MetaVRse Engine has the potential to drive the adoption of XR faster than ever before.

You have worked in the XR field for a long time… what is your outlook on the future of AR and VR in the enterprise in the upcoming years?

I started working in XR in 2014, long before the term was even coined.  Over the past few years, I have seen a steady increase in the demand for these technologies, with many organizations experimenting, learning, and building pilots and POCs looking for the ‘killer’ apps that drive real enterprise value.  From these experiments, we have learned that the following applications are the fastest growing in the industry.  I anticipate explosive growth in the following areas:

• 3D on Web – eCommerce, Training, Education, Marketing, Sales
• WebXR – Retail, Healthcare, Training, Education
• Remote AR Assistance – Manufacturing, Field Service, Maintenance, In-Home Assistance
• Virtual Try-On’s (VTO) – Makeup, Glasses, Hats, Shoes, Apparel (Here is an article I wrote on VTO’s)
• 360° (3-dof) – Training, Site Inspection, Employee Onboarding

It is important to note that while headworn VR and AR devices will continue to grow fast, the majority of the market right now is in the palm of everyone’s hands.  In my humble opinion, the fastest path to mass market adoption of XR, is through the device we all carry in our pockets.  If we can get enough people creating 3D and immersive content on mobile devices, it will be a natural transition from phone to face over the next 3-5 years.  

If we fail to engage creators to start building in 3D using spatial computing, the timeline for mass-market adoption will increase to 5-7 years. But I truly believe that COVID-19 has hyper-accelerated the demand for interactive, immersive digital products like the MetaVRse Engine. We are about to see an explosion of these technology products and platforms over the next decade that will rival that of the impact created by the internet itself.

Now is the time to invest in spatial computing so when this becomes mainstream, you and your organization are ahead of the curve that will quickly go from ‘nice-to-have’ to ‘must-have’.  

I remember you claimed time ago that you manage to earn $1M just thanks to LinkedIn. Can you give some lessons to we other XR entrepreneurs on how to grow our businesses?

In 2017, I decided to try and leverage LinkedIn as a social networking platform for business and in 12 months, I went from 6,000 connections to the cap of 30,000.  I did this by posting informative, fun and engaging content daily and focused on providing value and community building.  I very rarely tried to sell anyone anything and I believe that this ‘value-first’ method has created countless opportunities for our company, brand and my personal mission.  We have directly correlated over $1M in revenue from my personal LinkedIn and this continues to grow as the demand for knowledge in XR grows. 

Since hitting the LinkedIn cap of 30k, I have had to move things to our own email lists and subscriptions as we cannot rely on a system that limits our reach moving forward.  You can sign up for our email list on MetaVRse.com, XRIgnite.com or XRForBusiness.io 

I would strongly encourage you to leverage LinkedIn to build your personal brand and connect with potential collaborators and customers.  You can even learn directly from the platform making it one of the most important social platforms in the world.  If you aren’t using LinkedIn for your business daily, you are missing out.

Anything else you want to add to this interview?

I would like to ask each of you to try our MetaVRse Engine and provide your honest, open, and direct feedback so we can improve the product as quickly as possible.  This is a product to serve your needs, so if you see something that we can improve on or a feature you want to add, please let us know and we will add it to our roadmap.  

In the end, the real magic happens when people like you reading this article, leverage our platform to start building your vision.  We cannot wait to see what you will build with our platform and we are super excited to see how organizations and individuals leverage the power of spatial computing to help solve the world’s greatest challenges.  Please feel free to share the experiences you build by using our hashtag #MetaVRse in your social media posts.

You Sign up free today at:  https://engine.metavrse.com . Until September 1, 2020, Antony’s readers can use code GHOST to get a one month PRO license, free!