China’s Nanjing City district unveils new metaverse ambitions

Jiangning, a district within China’s Nanjing City, has signaled a desire to advance its metaverse development in a bid to compete with other Chinese cities.

The city’s ambitious plan was disclosed at a summit bordering on metaverse and artificial intelligence-generated content (AIGC) at the Jiangning High-tech Development Zone. Jiangning’s roadmap outlines a metaverse strategy that will follow a three-year plan and leverage other innovative technology, including artificial intelligence (AI), non-fungible tokens (NFTs), and cloud computing.

In the first year, the district aims to attract up to 60 metaverse startups to achieve an industry valuation of 4 billion yuan ($559 million). The district administrators are keen on establishing an innovation center and technology infrastructure at the provincial level before the end of 2023.

The second year of the plan will see an increase of metaverse firms to 120 in an attempt to reach a valuation of 10 billion yuan ($1.3 billion). The last year will record the integration of 200 metaverse service providers, specifically unicorns or publicly listed firms, to achieve an industry valuation of 20 billion yuan ($2.7 billion).

Attracting these firms to Jiangning is no mean feat, but startups may be lured to the district following the planned construction of metaverse application scenario clusters. These clusters are predicted to cut across several fields, including education, culture, e-commerce, sports, and tourism.

Jiangning’s metaverse roadmap indicates support for hardware enterprises in the design of AR/VR head-mounted displays and robots to hasten the retail adoption of virtual worlds. Other perks in Jiangning’s strategy include improving research and development institutions and creating a demonstration center for metaverse industrial applications.

District administrators are keen on strengthening brand building through several proposed initiatives. The first is an annual high-level summit designed to be a “gathering of the highest level expert,” followed by the launch of a national innovation and entrepreneurship competition.

China a hotbed of metaverse development

Several Chinese provinces have thrown their hats in the ring to become the center of all things metaverse in mainland China, setting the stage for frenetic industry development. Beijing led the charge by publishing a two-year metaverse strategy designed to rejuvenate its tourism sector.

Shortly after the announcement, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Suzhou, and Zhengzhou all indicated a desire to compete for the metaverse top spot in the country. The push into virtual worlds in China stems from the central government’s desire to strengthen the digital economy in line with the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

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