PYMNTS-MonitorEdge-May-2024

Nvidia, Deloitte Beat Meta to Punch With Enterprise VR Offering

Nvidia, Meta, Metaverse, technology, Omniverse Cloud

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg may talk a lot about business being done in the social media giant’s future metaverse, but companies like graphics chipmaker Nvidia and consulting giant Deloitte are already doing it.

On Sept. 20, Nvidia announced the launch of its Nvidia Omniverse Cloud, a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) — or “infrastructure-as-a-service” — suite of 3D design collaboration tools designed to allow “artists, developers and enterprise teams to design, publish, operate and experience metaverse applications anywhere,” the company said in a release.

“The metaverse, the 3D internet, connects virtual 3D worlds … viewed through a simulation engine,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said. “With Omniverse in the cloud, we can connect teams worldwide to design, build, and operate virtual worlds and digital twins” without the need for local computing power.

It uses Universal Scene Description (USD), a Pixar Animation Studios-developed 3D composition, simulation and collaboration ecosystem.

Along with Siemens and advertising and marketing giant WPP, an initial client is Rimac, the Croatian hypercar maker that owns Bugatti along with Porsche. The company is using an Omniverse Could metaverse for an automotive pipeline that stretches from design to marketing.

“Electric motors are efficient and can adjust in an instant,” founder and CEO Mate Rimac said in a statement. “Their flexibility allows engineers to create a car that can handle in a way a combustion engine car never could.”

Using Omniverse Cloud, he said, allows “our engineering teams to focus on the design of the car model itself, and spend less time on the intricacies of complex 3D design pipelines.”

At the far end, a 3D car configurator “experience” will allow buyers of the multimillion-dollar, bespoke hypercars access to the “endless possibilities for customization without having to manually render each layer, which saves time and money,” Rimac said.

Nvdia also announced it was adding the Omniverse to its Nvidia AI platform, used by Deloitte for hybrid cloud solutions that “help clients build and deploy a wide range of AI applications, including edge AI, speech AI, recommender systems, chatbots, cybersecurity, digital twins and more.”

‘CMO’ Has a Different Meaning

Meanwhile, the C-suite is expanding yet again to incorporate chief metaverse officers, Bloomberg said, adding that one part of their seven-figure jobs is to “win over internal skeptics.”

Brands like Disney, Proctor & Gamble, LVMH, and Crate & Barrel are filling this role, it said, although few actually use the “CMO” title that first appeared in video game maker firms — where they make sense.

Hollywood superagent firm CAA, on the other hand, gave Silicon Valley media executive Joanna Popper that exact title in August.

“At this pivotal time in our industry, the metaverse will be impactful to shifts in content creation, distribution, and community engagement that drive significant opportunity for our clients,” said President Jim Burtson, Variety reported.

Meta’s top metaverse executive is Vishal Shah, who carries the rather less impressive title “vice president, Metaverse.”

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PYMNTS-MonitorEdge-May-2024