The metaverse startup Thailand-based Translucia Global Innovation has partnered with Australian software development company Two Bulls and set aside an initial $100 million budget to build a Metaverse Research and Development Center (MRDC) in Melbourne..
Translucia is a subsidiary of the arts and entertainment company T&B Media Global, which in October 2021 launched its Translucia Metaverse projectwith an investment in the first phase of USD 283 million for the virtual world.
Now, T&B partners with Two Bulls to build the MRDC and bring the project to life with a soft launch scheduled for November this year.
Two Bulls founder and CEO James Kane told Cointelegraph that T&B undertook a worldwide search for a partner that could help realize the Translucia Metaverse project.
“There was an understanding that there would have to be significant research and development,” he said. “It is a very ambitious project”.
A series of talks between the two organizations this year resulted in the realization that Two Bulls’ best role would be as a research and development (R&D) center to help build it:
“We have been present from the beginning in the conversations about the innovative elements of this metaverse project. What is it going to be like, what is the experience going to be and what kind of technology platforms is it going to work on.”
“The center itself is really an extension of what Two Bulls already does,” Kane added..
Skilled local Melbourne workforce and an R&D tax incentive of up to 45 cents for every dollar spent helped seal the deal:
“The R&D incentives we receive are a deciding factor in T&D establishing a center like this in Australia.”
What to investigate
Many new areas will have to be explored for the project, not only in terms of hardware and software, but also in system economics and gamification.. Part of the project will also focus on improving the energy consumption of the Metaverse.
The MRDC will focus on technology, creating demos to get user feedback, and creating what he calls a “GDD.”or game design document:
“It’s much bigger than that because we’re really designing an entire world. It has to have a working economy, it has to be well moderated, it has to have all these different components that are going to make it a nice place to be.”
Although there is a lot of work to be done before the MRDC and the metaverse open their doors, Kane says that there is already a lot of interest. He gave the example of Magnolia Quality Development Corporation, a large Thai developer company that has already signed on to be a “galaxy”:
“Within the metaverse there will be ‘galaxies’ and some companies have already signed on to be galaxies within that larger metaverse. T&B is in talks with dozens of others and there will be announcements on that.”
Kane said that a notable difference from other metaverses such as Decentraland and Sandbox was that the Translucia metaverse was committed to sustainability and had a more people-friendly vision.
He commented on some of the concerns about the philosophy and vision of other unidentified metaversessaying:
“A lot of metaverses revolve around speculation and opportunism, whereas in this metaverse there is really a strong core vision around putting people before currency, putting people before profit, and putting environmental concerns before profit.”
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