Marketverse #1
Why do I bet on in-game advertising, and will advertising budgets move to Apple?
January 13, 2023
We may not yet notice it in our "adult" daily lives, but teenagers' parents certainly do: the line between the virtual and real worlds is slowly getting blurred. The last few months have been marked by the metaverse buzzword we've heard from the mouths of various corporations. However, I would argue that the virtual worlds of the future will be created not by today's social networks but by game producers. The only meaningful metaverse I've personally been in is Fortnite - and it will be hard to convince me to change that opinion. When it comes to hardware, Apple seems like the obvious dark horse. In my opinion, Apple glasses will become an enabler of the metaverse, just as the iPhone has become a giant enabler for mobile gaming. But why am I writing this in a newsletter aimed at our industry? Because if the above assumption is correct, then the currently emerging in-game ad systems will become the future ad networks. Perhaps it's in ecosystems like COMBO! that we'll spend the lion's share of our marketing budgets in a few years. Well, unless Apple blocks them.
Simon Paroszkiewicz, Human Intelligence on Demand
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🇫🇷 Media network for in-game advertising
In-game advertising is the next big thing in marketing. A TapJoy survey found that 41% of respondents said they were more likely to pay attention to mobile game ads - compared to only 17% for internet ads and 15% for magazines and billboards. Gameloft, a leading mobile video games developer, takes in-game advertising to the next level by offering The Gaming Media Network COMBO! It offers integrated access to 1.3 billion active monthly players and more than 100 games. It has also created a unique partnership between top game publishers, who previously competed for advertisers. “Over recent years, gaming has become the new playground for brands. However, despite this context, we noticed that there was no existing highly curated global in-game media network dedicated to brands.” - says Alexandre Tan, executive vice-president, at Gameloft.
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🇺🇸 Mixed-reality headset from Apple
After seven years of research and development, Apple is almost ready to introduce its first mixed-reality headset. The new gadget might resemble a pair of ski goggles, and it will have multiple cameras so the system can follow your movements in real-time and view events outside your home. The company will probably unveil the product to consumers in June under the name Reality Pro. The tech giant has already given the device to a select group of well-known software developers for testing, enabling them to work on third-party applications. The operating system for the device, internally known as "Borealis," will be officially referred to as xrOS. It will certainly be the most important introduction for Apple in 2023.
🇳🇱 Creator economy is still growing
The recent generative AI boom works well for Creative Fabrica, which was first established as an online store for digital items, but now serves as a marketplace for graphics, fonts, print-on-demand posters, etc. The Amsterdam-based company has recently raised $61 million and will use the funds to expand its creative generative AI toolset. Since 2019, the creator economy has more than doubled to a projected $104.2 billion in 2022. The rapid development of AI tools already has a huge impact on the whole market. Over 15 million graphics were created in the last three months using CF Spark, a company’s tool for generating images using text prompts.
🇨🇳 ByteDance dives into e-commerce
Last year, Chinese shoppers spent $208 billion on products bought on ByteDance's Douyin app (the local version of TikTok). This is an impressive increase of 76% from 2021. Meanwhile, the gross merchandise volume (GMV) of TikTok users in Southeast Asia increased by more than four times to $4.4 billion. It makes sense then that ByteDance wants to grab an even bigger share of the cake and expand its e-commerce presence. The company has had internal discussions about expanding its e-commerce activities this year to more nations, such as the United States, Brazil, Spain, and Australia. In early November, TikTok began testing its e-commerce feature, TikTok Shop, in the United States. This feature enables users to shop online without ever leaving the app. The expansion occurs at a time when TikTok may be experiencing an existential crisis in the United States, where some lawmakers are attempting to outlaw the app over worries about national security.
🇺🇸 Microsoft presents its voice AI tool
A new text-to-speech AI model named VALL-E was unveiled by Microsoft researchers. Given just a three-second audio sample, the tool can accurately mimic one's voice and create audio of that person saying anything. Listen to the impressive examples of the AI system in action. According to its developers, VALL-E could be combined with other generative AI models like GPT-3 to create audio content and be used for high-quality text-to-speech applications, speech editing, etc. Researchers are also aware of the possible dangers the tool can bring. "Since VALL-E could synthesize speech that maintains speaker identity, it may carry potential risks in misuse of the model, such as spoofing voice identification or impersonating a specific speaker. To mitigate such risks, it is possible to build a detection model to discriminate whether an audio clip was synthesized by VALL-E.”
🇵🇱 Crypto tax automation tool
Polish start-up Cryptiony wants to make cryptocurrency tax calculation simple, quick, and reasonable for individuals, traders, and tax professionals. “If crypto ever was part of a separate universe, it isn’t now. Tax authorities are treating trading profits just like any other capital gain, and taxpayers are waking up to the risks of non-compliance. It’s a big market already and, as web3 becomes mainstream, is going to get even bigger.” - says Bartosz Milczarek, the company’s co-founder and CEO. Cryptiony has recently closed a €500k pre-seed financing. Previously self-funded, the additional capital will allow the start-up to enter the UK, the biggest cryptocurrency market in Europe. The company’s subscription model gives it a significant cost advantage over rivals.
🇬🇧 Facial age estimation scanners in UK shops
In an experiment involving several grocery chains in the UK, facial recognition technology combined with artificial intelligence (AI) has produced promising results when it comes to determining the age of the shoppers. The UK Home Office's trial also gave customers a chance to test out a digital ID app. Consumers who used facial age estimation technology looked at a camera at the self-checkout to allow the algorithm to conduct the estimation. The whole process took just around three seconds. Yoti, the company behind the technology, claimed that it was better at estimating someone’s age than humans.
🌏 App economy is slowing down
Results from an annual study by Data.ai, a mobile analytics company, show that consumer spending on mobile applications decreased in 2022 after growing by 19% the year before. According to the research, consumer spending fell by 2% in 2022 and totaled $167 billion. It is the first time the app economy has reported a decrease. However, downloads increased by 11% year over year to 255 billion, while hours spent using just Android app apps increased by 9% to 4.1 trillion. Data.ai reports that non-game apps have actually proven to be more resilient in a down economy. The amount spent on games fell by 5% to $110 billion in 2022, while the amount spent on non-game apps rose by 6% to $58 billion.
🇪🇺 European tech companies at CES
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES), one of the most important tech events in the world, hosted a sizable number of European startups this year. The meeting, which took place in Las Vegas, was attended by a total of 3,200 exhibitors, including 200 tech companies from France, 70 from the Netherlands, and more than 20 from Germany.
🇹🇷 Are we going back to the office?
The largest speedy grocery chain in Europe, Getir, doesn’t want its employees to work from home anymore. The Turkish company has asked all office-based employees to return to the office full-time. The decision was made to end "hazy, non-committal hybrid that often ends in empty offices". It is against the post-pandemic trend of embracing more flexible work arrangements, but Getir is not the first company that wants to reverse it. Elon Musk instructed Twitter personnel to report to work in November after doing the same for Tesla staff in June.
🇺🇸 Customized 3D-printed supplements
Neutrogena has partnered with the manufacturer of 3D-printed nutritional supplements, Nourished, to provide customized skin care gummies, SkinStacks. Similar artificial intelligence technology is used in Neutrogena's Skin360 digital skin assessment, which enables consumers to scan photographs of their faces for a skincare analysis. Customers can order customized SkinStacks on the company’s website. Will customizable products supported by AI become the new standard in the beauty & skincare market, or are they just a marketing trick?
🇫🇷 Public funds for deep-tech startups
The French government will invest 500 million euros in stimulating the creation of deep-tech start-ups. It is part of a wider strategy dating back to 2019 aimed at supporting domestic deep-tech start-ups that develop breakthrough technologies. Akemia is one of the companies that has already benefited from government funding. It uses artificial intelligence to facilitate the discovery of new drugs.
🇺🇸 Will ChatGPT get funding from Microsoft?
Reuters reports that Microsoft is discussing investing $10 billion in OpenAI, the owner of AI tools like ChatGPT and DALL-E.This investment might help Microsoft improve its position in the Google-dominated web search market. Microsoft had already given $1 billion to OpenAI in 2019. Microsoft's cloud services division also provides the computer power the AI company requires. OpenAI expects to reach $200 million in revenue in 2023 and $1 billion by 2024.
🇱🇻 Starlink internet on the plane
Latvian airline airBaltic announced that it will install SpaceX's Starlink Internet connection system on its entire fleet of Airbus A220-300 aircraft. From the moment airBaltic passengers board the plane, they will be able to use free high-speed Internet access during the entire flight without any hassles or additional steps.
🇺🇸 AI writes ad script
It was just a matter of time before companies started using the Internet sensation, ChatGPT. In Mint Mobile’s new ad, Ryan Reynolds (the company’s owner by the way) reads off the AI-generated script. Are you curious about the results? See the ad by yourself.
ChatGPT Writes a Mint Mobile Ad
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