University of Sharjah to preserve UAE culture with Blockchain Metaverse system

University of Sharjah to preserve UAE culture with Blockchain Metaverse system

UAE University of Sharjah has launched a research project aimed to develop a blockchain metaverse system to preserve the UAE culture and heritage. Working with BSV Blockchain Association, the University of Sharjah plans to retain ownership of UAE culture in the form of digital assets, and then develop an NFT and physical marketplace where users can exchange physical originals as well as NFTs all in a metaverse environment.

Prof. Maamar Bettayeb, Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Studies at The University of Sharjah noted that this was a very pragmatic use case utilizing technologies such as Blockchain, metaverse and NFTs. He states, “The University is serving the community and UAE’s national economy by implementing the vision of the Emirate of Sharjah as well as the UAE in documenting and preserving our history and heritage in both tangible and intangible formats.”

 Mr. Jimmy Nguyen, Bitcoin Association for BSV Founding President, added “We are very excited and pleased with the partnership with a premier institution in the UAE such as the University of Sharjah to develop an innovative solution that utilizes the latest technologies to preserve the nation’s values and history in UAE and the region. Launching a new start-up will help in creating many jobs for the new technology graduates and create new economy for trading antiques, historic and modern artworks in a digital format and in virtual marketplace as NFTs”.

Dr. Mohamed Al Hemairy, the leading researcher at the University of Sharjah explained, “UAE has a very wealthy culture and human heritage, characterised by numerous physical inheritances. Yet new generations and expatriates don’t know much about it, that is why we researched how we could deploy Blockchain to preserve the intellectual property and ownership of the Emirati’s Families inherited treasures and to design a virtual art gallery for the Arabic and Islamic culture, heritage, antiques, historic and modern artworks in a state-of-the-art digital format. These would be digitized in the form that would retain its intellectual property through Non-Fungible Tokens [NFT].”

The heritage and culture of the UAE will be in a virtual art gallery in the Metaverse built on BSV Blockchain.  

Mr. Muhammad Anjum, the Head of the BSV Hub for MESA, commented “Developing relationships and supporting the academic institutions is a key goal of our regional BSV Hub and an impactful way that the blockchain technology can grow in the Middle East. The University of Sharjah has brought a very strong use case to utilize the powerful features of the BSV blockchain. The Dubai Metaverse Strategy is an innovative initiative and a key step towards making UAE the first country in the world in the field of adoption and use of the metaverse. We are confident that we will see numerous engagements between BSV Ecosystem, and the University of Sharjah soon.”

Animoca Brands The Sandbox to bring its metaverse to Dubai UAE

Animoca Brands The Sandbox to bring its metaverse to Dubai UAE

Animoca’s brand, the Sandbox announced during the 62 edition of the True Global Ventures Conference that it will be bringing its metaverse strategy to Dubai, with the ‘Dubaiverse’. It will work with local partners including Khaleej Times media outlet. 

Animoca Brand’s Dubai-themed metaverse will follow the blueprint of its subsidiary Sandbox’s Hong Kong “Mega City,’ a gaming metaverse and virtual cultural hub based on the Asian financial hub of Hong Kong.

As per the news on Forkast, the  Dubaiverse will be built through local partnerships, In doing so, the Hong Kong-based blockchain game specialist will partner with firms in the film, music, entertainment, acting, finance, real estate, and gaming industries.

Sebastien Borget, cofounder and chief operating officer (COO) of Sandbox Paris, added, “Other planned location-based metaverses are in the works for Singapore, Korea, and Turkey.”

Dubai’s virtual asset regulator was the first regulator in the world to purchase a piece of land in Sandbox. Borget noted, “It’s been a key moment, and from there, we’ve been able to attract other major local partners and brands.”

Mehtap Onder, Managing Director for Dubai at GCEX, a digital brokerage firm, said they will also enter Animoca’s metaverse, offering virtual asset education in a way that couldn’t be accomplished before. 

The Dubaiverse will also have a local news partner, in Khaleej Times following a similar partnership between Hong Kong’s Sandbox and local newspaper the South China Morning Post.

“As publishers, business models are being challenged all over the world, and new business models come into this space, it’s a really important strategic move for us,” said Sohail Nawaz, Chief Digital Officer of Khaleej Times. 

True Global Ventures with a presence in the UAE announced its total investments in Animoca Brands have reached US$38 million.

UAE Metaverse solutions provider MetaEssence launches its G2B2C solution

UAE Metaverse solutions provider MetaEssence launches its G2B2C solution

UAE based MetaEssence launches the world’s first specialized G2B2C (Government to Business to Consumer) utility-based Web3.0 and Metaverse solutions provider.  

MetaEssence focuses on Web3.0 & Metaverse enablement through three main business domains: digital health, digital economy, and sustainability. Introducing innovative solutions to accelerate the government agencies and organizations’ digital transformation, and contributing to the vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai to cement the UAE’s position as a global capital for the digital economy. 

Fatma ElSafty, Founder and CEO of MetaEssence, states,” Our vision is to enable simplified, secure, and reliable access to a wide range of Web3.0 & Metaverse solutions where our customers find synergies between their services and securely execute transactions with a business value add. At MetaEssence We emphasize our products value and end results. All our products are blockchain agnostic and we are very keen on building long-term partnerships through a well-established transaction-based model.” 

MetaEssence’s solutions for Digital health and specifically medical tourism will introduce a better patient experience using smart contracts, where patients will have secure access to quality healthcare providers anywhere in the world. Via Metaverse and mixed reality; patients can simulate their experience while the advantageous environment for smart contracts between patients, providers, and payers in the overall system will eliminate many touch points through a more simplified, secure, and patient-centric solution. Thanks to blockchain, Web3.0, and Metaverse technologies to make this possible.

 MetaEssence is planning to launch this year “MetaEssence Heroes Program” to leverage MetaEssence Superheroes group of Worldwide experts in Web3, NFTs, Crypto Risks, regulation, Data Security, blockchain, Mixed reality, and Metaverse to train the new heroes on the “why” and “how” to use these technologies in their organizations.

True Global Ventures with a presence in UAE invests $17.2 million in unicorn company Animoca Brands

True Global Ventures with a presence in UAE invests $17.2 million in unicorn company Animoca Brands

True Global Ventures 4 plus, (TGV-4 Plus) Fund with a presence in the UAE and TGV 4 Plus Follow On Fund (TGV 4 Plus FoF) have invested a $17.2m convertible note investment into Animoca Brands out of a total raise of US$110m.  The current investment further supports Animoca Brands’ mission to deliver digital property rights to the world’s gamers and Internet  users,  thereby  creating  a  new  asset  class,  play-to-earn  economies,  and  a  more equitable digital framework contributing to the building of the open metaverse.

Other investors included Boyu Capital, Singapore’s Sovereign Wealth Fund Temasek and GGV Capital.

The investment comes after Animoca Brands’ second closing at a valuation of US$5.9 billion (based on Australian dollar exchange rates at the time),  announced on July 12, 2022. The company is a leader in digital entertainment, blockchain, gamification, and digital property rights in open metaverse.  

TGV is a distributed fund with a presence in over 20 cities, including Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei, New York, San Francisco, Vancouver, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Moscow, Stockholm, Paris, Madrid and Warsaw. TGV4 Follow on Fund includes $5 million investment from Middle East partners  making up 3.4 percent of the fund investment. 

TGV has been an early backer of Animoca Brands since early 2019 and has seen it achieve unicorn status in May 2021. Animoca Brands has derived much of its growth in value from the revenues of its blockchain projects and subsidiaries, as well as the over 340 investments it has made in the open metaverse.

 Valerie Hawley, Affiliate Partner, True Global Ventures 4+ speaking to LaraontheBlock says, “Current market conditions offers many challenges but also opportunities.  It is during these challenging times when the true leaders of the web3 space will emerge.  There is no finer example of this than Yat Siu and the Animoca team.  We at True Global Ventures are delighted to be able to continue to support their growth.”

Besides Animoca Brands, the TGV 4 Plus base fund has also invested in other leading companies such as The Sandbox (a subsidiary of Animoca Brands), Forge, Chromaway, Coinhouse, GCEX, Chronicled, Enjinstarter, Iomob and Dedoco and others. 

This is the first investment made by the new TGV 4 Plus FoF, which focuses on investing a majority of its capital into selected TGV 4 Plus base fund companies. TGV 4 Plus Follow On Fund will consider making additional investments in other late stage web3 deals as the opportunities arise.

The TGV 4 Plus FoF completed its first closing in June 2022 for US$146m. TGV 4 Plus FoF has 15 General Partners (GP) who lead the fund and its Investment Committee, investing more than US$62m of their money into the fund. This represents a total GP commitment of over 40% of the total fund size and over US$4m per GP on average.

Yat Siu, the co-founder and executive chairman of Animoca Brands, commented: “We are honoured that the TGV 4 Plus Follow On Fund has chosen Animoca Brands as its first investment and are deeply grateful for TGV’s continued support. Thanks to the shared network effect of the open metaverse, the funding of late stage companies like us also provides a boost to early stage growth, so we believe this is a positive development for the entire ecosystem.”

TGV General Partner Dušan Stojanović adds, “I’m impressed by the number and quality of strategic acquisitions and investments that Animoca Brands has made. It is one of the big winners of the market correction, and is likely to emerge stronger from this down market similarly to how companies like Amazon emerged from the Dotcom crash.”

WadzPay teams up with DIFC Fintech Hive to offer blockchain payment features in the Metaverse

WadzPay teams up with DIFC Fintech Hive to offer blockchain payment features in the Metaverse

WadzPay, blockchain payments provider operating in the UAE, has teamed up with DIFC (Dubai International Financial Centre) Fintech Hive and Emirates NBD accelerator program, to offer payment features in the metaverse. This is a huge undertaking given that the metaverse economy is predicated to hit $13 trillion by 2030.  

Moreover this is especially significant in the UAE given that Dubai announced its metaverse strategy in July 2022. As per the strategy Dubai wants to attract 5000 blockchain and metaverse companies to the city by 2027. DIFC has been working through its regulatory arm DFSA to ensure the proper regulatory environment for crypto tokens, security tokens, and is considered by VARA as one of the entities that can house regulated companies in this sphere.

Raja Al Mazrouei, Executive VP of DIFC Fintech Hive was quoted saying, “The 10-week global accelerator programme for metaverse start-ups reaffirms our commitment to support Dubai’s ambition to be among the top 10 metaverse economies in the world.”

We all know that for the metaverse to be successful, payment services in the metaverse will not only have to be seamless but extremely secure as well as compliant. Each metaverse will have to have a robust payment method or it won’t be a fully functional experience.

Noteworthy as well is that Emirates NBD has stated that it intends to build up its 3D capabilities, creating virtual worlds to augment the customer experience and enabling a decentralised payment infrastructure for customers to create, monetise, buy and sell digital assets and services.

Now let’s put it all together, Dubai wants to be a metaverse hub; the UAE has already piloted a CBDC project not only with Saudi Arabia but also other central banks with the wholesale CBDC project Mbridge which is in partnership with BIS and Hong Kong Monetary Authority, Thailand and Central Bank of China. The Mbridge pilot has already commenced with commercial banks in 2022.

So far 105 countries across the globe are exploring CBDCs, with only 9 percent of countries having actually launched a CBDC.

For those not familiar with WadzPay, it is an interoperable and agnostic blockchain payments ecosystem that was founded in Singapore in 2018 but is currently operating across Asia and the Middle East with offices in UAE. As per their website, the company has been working with large payment companies, banks, on CBDC rollouts and digital assets transactions and settlements.

So when Anish Jain Founder & Group Chief Executive Officer of WadzPay announced on LinkedIn, that the company is working with DIFC Fintech hub and Emirates NBD accelerator program to enable financial services in the metaverse, it was newsworthy.  

LaraontheBlock, asked Jain what this meant and how they were working with DIFC, his reply, “WadzPay established its presence in UAE in 2020 with its DIFC entity. The DIFC FinTech hive provided tools to grow our business. It is also the breeding ground for innovation. WadzPay Chain is purpose built for payments and is metaverse ready. Together with the WadzPay payments ecosystem it will provide users with optionality, agility and access into the metaverse while making traditional payments efficient.”

In conclusion, maybe we will be witnessing the first complete financial service and payment offering in a metaverse experience within the UAE sooner than we think. A digital wallet that would or could hold CBDC, stablecoins, crypto that users in the metaverse could utilize for the purchase of digital assets or representations of physical assets as NFTs securely and compliantly.

We will know which start-ups have been chosen to implement these projects with Emirates NBD as they will be announced during Gitex2022.

 In the end it is only when you can garner valued economic activity in the metaverse will the metaverse actually have any sort of true utility.

On the side-lines, it was also interesting to see that WadzPay had signed a strategic partnership with FIGA an enterprise in the Republic of Congo to tokenize the rights of reserves of potash, phosphate and iron which will be extracted over the next 25 years. WadzPay is expected to tokenize $4 billion worth of assets for foreign direct investment.

WadzPay also partnered with Algorand Blockchain where it will utilize Algorand platform in multiple proof of concept-stage projects including Asia and Africa-based CBDC launches.

Qatar University joins a handful of global universities in the metaverse

Qatar University joins a handful of global universities in the metaverse

Qatar University has signed an MOU with Metavisionaries, a community of change makers, thought leaders and industry experts who are committed to providing access to the space economy and frontier technologies to build socially inclusive competency and human capacity required to meet immediate and future sustainability challenges.

Metavisionaries is offering MetaEduVersity and space campus the Metaship which utilizes web3 and the metaverse combined with our physical SPACE INNOVATION LABS with our partners ICE Cubes.

Qatar University while espousing to be the first university in the metaverse, will actually be joining 10 other US based universities who will be offering metaverse experience in the fall of 2022. Prior to Qatar University announcement, ten universities are getting set to launch their own metaversities this fall to provide students and professors with a “digital twin” replica campus in which to attend courses, using a Meta Quest 2 virtual reality headset provided through a partnership with VictoryXR and Meta.

The announcement said students at Morehouse College in Georgia, the University of Kansas School of Nursing, New Mexico State University, South Dakota State University, Florida A&M University, West Virginia University, Southwestern Oregon Community College, California State University, Alabama A&M University and University of Maryland Global Campus will be able to use the technology to attend courses synchronously from anywhere.

In addition the University of Tokyo also announced it will be launching a wide range of educational programs in the metaverse in 2022. The international Space University, also entered the metaverse with Metavisionaries in the Metaship for an onsite lecture. 

As for Qatar University, Dr. Omar Al Ansari Vice-President for Academic Affairs at Qatar University, was sent to the International Space Station through Metavisonaries’ partners, ICE Cubes and Malleth II Program in which he stated, “I am proud to be inspiring our next generation with Metavisionaries by bringing space curricula to the masses and providing them with immersive learning experiences to prepare them to create sustainable future and a better world for all.”

During her keynote speech that took place in the metaverse spaceship, Dean Sobh said: “As the National leading university in Qatar and top ranked in the region, we should take the lead in pushing boundaries and keep reinventing our purpose, curricula and pedagogies to remain relevant and prepare our graduate for success in an increasingly turbulent, uncertain and challenging environment. Web 3.0 will play an ever-increasing role in education in the next few decades. When the history of the educational metaverse is written, we would like to be cited as one of the ground-breaking universities.”

She added that the College of Business and Economics is partnering with Metavisionaries, Ice cubes, Space applications and other global partners to launch a Global Space Sustainability challenge that would bring together students from different disciplines and universities around the globe in the aim to come up with innovative solutions that tackle pressing issues related to one or more areas of Sustainable Development Goals.

“We need to reimagine business and should no longer make trade-offs between profit and advancing sustainability. We can achieve synergies between the two and leverage space to help achieve that,” said Dean Sobh.

Wasim Ahmed, CEO for Metavisionaries, said: “The pandemic accelerated the rate of technology adoption in the education sector. Web 3.0 and the Metaverse are paving the way for education to be reimagined. In that sense, the partnership with Qatar University showcases the university’s determination to play a leading role in shaping and enabling the transformation to prepare future generations for the future of work.”

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UAE Everdome metaverse receives 10 million USD to expand its offering

UAE Everdome metaverse receives 10 million USD to expand its offering

As UAE based Everdome, hyper realistic metaverse, prepared for the release of its Everdome Astro NFT collection which will be available for Genesis NFT holders, Everdome announced that GEM Digital Limited, a digital asset investment firm  invested 10 million USD in the company.

Everdome’s NFT collection will be the first metaverse wearable NFT inside Everdome.

Since June 2022, a total of 11,700 plots (97%) located throughout the Everdome metaverse were sold throughout an eight week auction experience. In total, plots were purchased for upwards of US$18.6 million, which is equivalent to 1,531,000,000 $DOME, Everdome’s own digital currency. The average price of a plot of land in Everdome was 130,000 $DOME.

Everdome will control the timing and the number of drawdowns under this facility, and has no minimum drawdown obligation. At its discretion, Everdome has the ability to sell up to 200% of their average daily volume in Tokens across multiple exchanges to GEM Digital.

According to Rob Gryn, CEO and Founder of Everdome, the commitment from GEM will be used to strengthen Everdome’s offering and ensure future sustainability in the business. “We’re thrilled to partner with and achieve this investment commitment milestone with GEM, which confirms that we’re on the right track as we seek to push new boundaries in the metaverse. This is the perfect time for us to put our foot on the gas and really grow our product, which GEM’s investment commitment will help us to do. Everdome is in a very exciting place, and together with GEM we’ve taken the next step in order to build our metaverse ecosystem to the next level.”

GEM’s investment will be focused on team growth and metaverse technological expansion, and will see the game’s virtual reality (VR) capabilities set on a fast track. Funds will also go towards boosting marketing efforts, partnership enablement, and investments that will aid Everdome’s sustainable growth.

Set to launch in three phases throughout 2022, Everdome takes users on an immersive journey from Hatta in the UAE, which is widely viewed via rocket launches, to colonize Mars in Everdome City. The metaverse platform leverages cutting-edge 3D scanning technology and Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 5 to deliver state-of-the-art, photo-realistic graphics that will leave players wondering about the boundaries between gameplay and reality.

India based NFT startup raises $3.26 million with participation of UAE investors

India based NFT startup raises $3.26 million with participation of UAE investors

Artfi, a non-fungible token (NFT) focused startup, has raised $3.26 million from several investors including Sheikha Hend Al Qassemi, a member of the ruling family of Emirate of Sharjah, and Raza Beig, director of Landmark Group, UAE.

The current funding was raised at a valuation of $100 million. Artfi is on a mission to democratize the fine art space by fractionizing high-value artworks into limited editions NFTs.

The NFTs will be minted on the polygon network. The fine art fintech company is now gearing up for whitelisting for its first fine art NFT offering from August and is also working towards developing a museum in the metaverse where the art collection will be always accessible.

Asif Kamal, Founder of Artfi stated that the company will use the investment funds to build its technology and a dedicated marketplace for fine art NFTs. A portion of the funds will also be deployed to strengthen its product and team.

Kamal stated in an interview, “Artfi was launched with a vision to make art accessible to everyone. People can now invest in fine art with a very nominal investment and can liquidate it whenever they need to by using the secondary marketplace. At the end of the day, the company will re-sell the art that the Artfi Museum holds on behalf of NFT owners and share the profit with each NFT holder who owns shares in the painting. This is an opportunity for people to now diversify their portfolios from stocks, fixed deposits etc. and invest in one of the largest asset classes that have outperformed all these traditional investments for over 30 years.”

Artfi has already onboarded paintings from eminent personalities including contemporary British artist Sacha Jafri and Indian abstract artist VS Gaitonde.

5000 Blockchain and metaverse companies to be in Dubai by 2027

5000 Blockchain and metaverse companies to be in Dubai by 2027

Dubai has officially launched its metaverse strategy which will bring on 5000 blockchain and metaverse companies to the city by 2027. His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Dubai Executive Council has launched the directives of the Dubai Metaverse strategy. 

As per his tweet, the Dubai Metaverse strategy will add 5 times more Blockchain and Metaverse companies to Dubai within the next five years. Knowing that today Dubai currently has 1000 Blockchain and metaverse entities, this means that by 2027 there should be 5000 Blockchain metaverse companies at least in Dubai UAE.

As Sheikh Hamdan stated, “It will also add 40,000 new jobs in the virtual world and bring in 4 billion USD to Dubai’s economy in the next 5 years.”

He notes, “Today we have launched our metaverse strategy which is the next economic and technological revolution that will play a role in every facet of our lives for the next two decades to come. We currently have 1000 companies in Dubai who are working in this domain and who currently add 500 million USD yearly to our national economy; we expect this will increase in the near future.”

Sheikh Hamdan added that the Dubai metaverse strategy will encourage innovation in the metaverse as well as government utilization of the metaverse while growing the talent base. He states, “Our aim from launching this comprehensive metaverse strategy early on is so that we can be one of the top 10 globally in this field. Dubai has and will continue to remain a pioneer because H.H. Mohammad bin Rashid Al Maktoum has proven over and over again the fruitfulness of his future vision and development.”

Back in March Dubai had announced it would be working on its metaverse strategy. 

UAE ChainTech Labs launches first reward bearing tokens marketplace from DIFC

UAE ChainTech Labs launches first reward bearing tokens marketplace from DIFC

ChainTech Labs, the first Reward Bearing tokens marketplace, with custom smart contracts and vaulting technologies that will enable startups and SMEs to get funded utilizing a novel token issuing framework, has launched out of UAE specifically out of DIFC (Dubai International Financial Center).

On its twitter page it states that it is the first DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) out DIFC in UAE.

As per their website, ChainTech builds next generation Dapps for government agencies, global conglomerates and companies operating in over 40 different industries. The company also manages NFT communities. They state that the “total token market cap under their command reached 100,000,000 USD in June 2022.

They have developed BAPESCLAN which is a metavestor NFT DAO with a total market cap of 60,000,000. Minting officially started today. They also have developed BLOODLINES™, the first decentralized animated series, created and owned by its holders, that bridges the gap between Hollywood and Web 3.

Their product offering includes ChainLaunch a Launchpad for highly professional NFT projects and companies with a major focus on metaverse play-to-earn gaming, ChainRescue™ an NFT consultancy service that assists and embraces NFT projects and their communities with promising missed potential, ChainVest™, the world’s first marketplace for Reward Bearing Tokens (RBTs) that enables startups and SMEs to raise capital like never before. RBTs provide holders with access points in the metaverse to earn rewards, ChainReality™ a realistic digital twin of our world, also known as a meta-world. It is built entirely on Unreal Engine 5 with realistic avatars created with Metahuman.

In addition they have developed ChainCapital™, the world’s first DAO Metafund powered by fractionalized ownership, facilitating the fundamental concept of distribution of wealth and power and ChainPaid™ a service that enables private and business payments of any bill or invoice using any cryptocurrency. There has never been a smoother way to pay for anything then now.

Above and beyond all this, in a twitter teaser they announced that they will be partnering with Dubai Blockchain Center and will announce this during the Dubai Fintech Week on the 28th and 29th of June. Both Dr. Marwan Alzarouni, CEO at the Dubai Blockchain Center, and Erik Lydecker, MD at Chaintech Labs Limited will be present.