The green giant plants a seed in the metaverse

CBRE’s latest office is barely 500 sq ft, lies on the farthest edge of an unpopulated area and sits on a plot of land that cost just £8,000. That’s because the green giant has just become the first of the big agents to establish an outpost in the metaverse. The plot lies on the southernmost edge of Decentraland – at -18,-150 if you fancy paying a visit. The four-storey building is simple, clean-lined and surrounded by the seasonal vacant plot skin seen so frequently in Decentraland. It is spring, so there are currently purply-pink flowers and leafy cartoon trees. In the distance you can see the outline of a range of hills. “It’s pretty far away from everything else,” acknowledges its creator, CBRE graduate Anthony Atkinson. “But, then again, it means we’ll always be surrounded by countryside. Well, until they decide to expand the world, that is.” It is far from any of the Times Square replicas, fashion boutiques or online gambling dens. In fact, its nearest neighbour appears to be a spawning site for some form of Pokemon rip-off. But Atkinson likes it. “This site used to belong to an artist who used it as a gallery space,” he says. When he shut up shop, Atkinson got in touch and bought it, adding the CBRE branding. CBRE’s digital advisory has been steadily becoming more savvy with these digital realms but it doesn’t have a dedicated metaverse team as yet. One of the reasons for this is that no one is entirely sure how big this is going to be. Read more >> Join the metaverse land rush It is currently educating its own teams on what the metaverse is, how to access it, and what to say if a client asks “should we be buying land in the metaverse?” Atkinson isn’t part of advisory, though. He is a graduate within global workplace solutions. That is one of the reasons why the site isn’t more central. Atkinson is far more interested in this a learning exercise than a branding opportunity. He wants the outpost to be a way of introducing clients and colleagues to Decentraland, to the whole concept of the metaverse, and to figure out together what it might have to offer. The point of being in Decentraland isn’t to have the most central plot or the flashiest “building”. “That isn’t how it works anyway,” he says. “Most people just teleport to where they want to go, so there isn’t much point being close to the action.” And it isn’t the only metaverse space Atkinson has created for his firm. Atkinson’s own hunch is that the decentralised metaverses, such as Decentraland, The Sandbox and so on, won’t be where people go for online meetings. Centralised metaverses are more likely to dominate, he says, if only because they will be owned by vast companies with millions of existing customers and very deep pockets. Atkinson has created another space, built using Unity Developer, which can be accessed by anyone with a password and an Oculus headset. And CBRE has a whole room full of those at Henrietta House, W1. “That’s where this started,” he says. “I thought I’d try my hand at building a virtual office.” Fortunately, Atkinson’s cousin is a game developer, so was able to lend a hand. He takes me for a quick tour. It is slick and functional. The walls and floor are high gloss and reflective, like a Manhattan bank in the 1990s. Portals lead to other spaces and screens display YouTube, Spotify and the news. “This is a first attempt at a propco metaverse,” Atkinson says, his avatar looking around him with endearing pride. It is proof of concept, and a little shiny for my tastes, but it looks like an actual meeting space. That is the advantage of a bespoke space, as opposed to being part of a larger metaverse such as Decentraland, which has to be pixelated and “cartoony” to avoid crashing visitors’ systems. As well as being the start of CBRE’s own metaverse, within which it can interact with clients, connecting, perhaps, with those in far-flung geographies, Atkinson’s virtual office is an attempt to show clients what is available. They can then tweak it if they want, brand it and pay CBRE to manage it for them. And what could be better than management fees for non-existent buildings? CBRE’s virtual office gives a hint as to where things could be heading, but at the moment it still seems like a gimmick. Atkinson agrees. “It is great to have a metaverse, but it is currently 10 times more inconvenient than just meeting face to face or talking over Zoom.” In order to have a place in our working lives, the metaverses will have to offer something extra. In the current version, when your avatar looks at a computer screen in the ‘verse, you will see your own desktop, with all of your content on it. Which is neat. You can also share content with colleagues. But Atkinson imagines a virtual world where you can shift seamlessly from an office meeting with distant colleagues or clients, to opening 3D models and exploring them. “One idea a colleague had was for you to have floorplans on the walls. When the client walks in to the space they can pick up the plans with their Oculus controller, and once they lay it on the table the world changes and they are walking through the front door of that building.” But it isn’t there yet. “Yeah, the functionality of that would test me,” he laughs, but he says it is certainly doable. “Give me three years.” To send feedback, e-mail piers.wehner@eg.co.uk or tweet @PiersWehner or @EGPropertyNews Images courtesy of CBRE