Just a little over two weeks ago, the United Arab Emirates’ ministry of economy revealed its new metaverse-based headquarters, and now another government entity in the Emirates has moved to the metaverse too.
The Emirate of Sharjah is UAE’s third largest and most populous cities alongside Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Its government has announced the launch of its “Virtual Transaction Centre — Metaverse,” a platform that’ll connect users to customer service who can process their documents.
Banking in the metaverse
The platform also features audio and video information about government services that are provided by the city’s Department of Town Planning and Survey. The UAE’s official News Agency shared that it includes a news feed from the department and a virtual map of Sharjah.
However, the city’s metaverse project is a collective approach between Sharjah’s Commerce and Tourism Development Authority and Multiverse Labs, a decentralised A.I ecosystem. The company shared a video on its YouTube channel which shows graphics of Sharjah such as a boat racing feature and human-like digital creations.
Meta’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg previously stated that it would take up to 15 years for his company to create a viable metaverse. However, with the rate at which cities in UAE are shifting towards the virtual space that’s labelled the next iteration of the internet, the world may not have to wait that long to witness a viable metaverse.
Isa Muhammad is a writer and video game journalist covering many aspects of entertainment media including the film industry. He's steadily writing his way to the sharp end of journalism and enjoys staying informed. If he's not reading, playing video games or catching up on his favourite TV series, then he's probably writing about them.
