The Metaverse for Telcos: Disruptive Threat or Opportunity?

The third post in this series looks at how telcos can approach the metaverse. Below are links to the first two posts:

• The Metaverse: Changing How We Live and Interact Forever
• The Metaverse Race is On

Since OTTs arrived, most telco operators became primarily data and connectivity vendors, with major innovations centering on increasing data speeds.

What are the options?

1. Block user access or charge premium access rates for such OTT services. That’s obviously wildly unpopular with users and no longer considered as a recommended course of action.
2. Tactically bundle OTT packages with existing services. In the short term, this may be enough to retain some level of customer loyalty, but it isn’t viable as a long term strategy.

Resistance or denial are both bad ideas; exploring how to collaborate with
OTT players and partners is the best possible situation.

As the metaverse is all about offering an experience that requires seamless data connectivity experience for applications like simultaneous 3D HD streaming & low-latency gaming, then:

✓ 5G will be the key to fulfilling user requirements for speed + latency + reliable connections
✓ Now is the time for telcos to launch tariff packages driven by premium packages. Tariffs with clear market messaging around experience, quality and become part of the metaverse ecosystem.

Laying out your metaverse strategy

Learn: There are many different interpretations of the metaverse, and various angles to learn about beyond the content.

Assess: While the metaverse will scale across many industry verticals, evaluate if there are relevant opportunities for the mobile connectivity business.

Create: Gain experience through internal development. Take the opportunity to explore creative consumer engagement through new channels, services, experiences, digital goods, and assets. Start small and move fast. Test and learn.

Connect: Start building a network of metaverse ecosystem participants. The world is still small, so high quality collaborations and partnerships are still available at a reasonable level of investment. Connect with a new generation and tap into alternative talent pools.

Establish: Get your business out there and position yourself to capture the hearts and minds of tech-forward sub-communities. Operators must ensure the underlying infrastructure is deployed as effectively as possible. For example, accelerating the deployment of new 5G base stations at the edge of the network. Thankfully, as 5G MBB/FWA wireless access can address such challenges, but operators need to shift the way networks are constructed. Today’s focus is planning for outdoor applications, but with the metaverse, operators need to consider indoors as key user requirements.

Further reading

• The Role of Connectivity in Building the Metaverse [article]
• The Role of Computing and AI in Building the Metaverse [article]
• 5G Huawei Carrier [webpage]

Disclaimer: Any views and/or opinions expressed in this post by individual authors or contributors are their personal views and/or opinions and do not necessarily reflect the views and/or opinions of Huawei Technologies.