Interest in the meta-universe has soared in 2022, and hardly a week goes by without another organization investing in Web3 or creating a new NFT series with a new report, and a new McKinsey report breaks down the reasons behind this emerging investment.

The report, Metaverse Value Creation, highlights that more than $120 billion has already been invested into the metaverse in 2022, more than double the 2021 total of $57 billion.

Big tech companies can be considered Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, Apple, and Google. Facebook's name change to Meta and Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard are some of the key moves for these companies.

Venture capital is investing heavily in the space, such as NFT marketplace OpenSea, which raised $300 million at a $13.3 billion valuation in a Series C round led by Paradigm and Coatue and Yuga Labs (creators of the Bored Ape Yacht Club), Raised $450 million at a $4 billion valuation to build a virtual world.

According to McKinsey, companies and brands outside of tech are devoting resources to support successful efforts.

Disney, for example, appointed a senior executive to oversee its meta-universe strategy, while Lego invested in Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite. Epic Games has also partnered with luxury brand Balenciaga, which has created a dedicated metaverse department and launched its latest collection within virtual space.

Leading investment sectors include energy and resources, high technology, media and entertainment, while industries that lag behind McKinsey are construction, transport and logistics.

Why should they invest?

McKinsey points to several factors as to why these organisations and entities are spending large sums in this developing industry. First, as technology continues to advance, and while significant technical challenges remain, leaders have seen blockchain inspire a decentralized creator economy and emerge as the most promising technology currently available to realize the future metauniverse's promise of interoperability between worlds.

Other advances include the increased availability of back-end engines, edge computing to power the metaverse, the advent of 5G, devices that fuse physical and virtual worlds, and the development of advanced software.

Another factor contributing to the increase in investment is the increasing readiness of stakeholders. With the importance of gaming, other use cases are rapidly emerging, including new AR/VR driven social media experiences, immersive retail, entertainment, sports and education.

Ken Wee, Activision Blizzard's chief strategy officer, told McKinsey, "Games are already very social, and social features are constantly being innovated. But when you're trying to attract people who don't self-identify as gamers, it's going to take a broader set of social engagement mechanisms to convince them to spend more time in the meta-universe.

Companies are also experimenting with metacomes, with Gucci creating a number of NFT launches, Nike having Nikeland at Roblox, and American fast food company Wendy's hosting an event at Fortnite and staking a claim on Horizon World.

McKinsey points out that in the long term, five daily activities will take place in the metacomes: gaming, social, fitness, business and distance learning.

"Use cases outside of games are not just the future, they are already here," Kavya Pearlman, founder and CEO of the XR Security Initiative, told McKinsey.

"According to the UN, 1.6 billion children switched to online learning with the pandemic, so this is an area ripe for disruption and many are looking for alternatives. We're also seeing a lot of experiments in the medical field, like using HoloLens for adjuvant surgery.

Metaverse will also enable incremental improvements in the enterprise space, improving current solutions and creating entirely new products. Some of these categories include enhanced remote collaboration, reimagined learning and development, and digital twining.

The report's authors said: "The meta-universe is at an inflection point in its evolution, due to factors ranging from the size of the opportunity to the drivers of expected growth and the amount of investment.

"We believe the intense interest over the past year has ignited dramatic corporate experiments that have set the stage for metaverse development and are likely to maintain momentum for the foreseeable future."