This image provided by Zigbang Co. shows a meeting room in metaverse platform Soma.
SEOUL, May 20 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s app-based home matching platform Zigbang Co. said Thursday that it had established a U.S. subsidiary called Soma Development Co. to help expand its presence in the global virtual office market.
On Friday, the company unveiled a new global virtual office platform called Soma, an upgraded version of the metaverse office service Metapolis that ZigBang developed in July 2021.
The Metapolis platform is already occupied by about 20 firms including Zigbang, Ourhome Ltd. and Atlantic Integrated Freight GmbH, with about 2,000 workers commuting on a daily basis.
These companies will move to Soma gradually starting from Friday. After their relocation is completed, the Metapolis platform will be terminated.
Soma is composed of a 30-story office building called Proptech Tower, a convention center with six 500-seat halls that can host large-scale events, and a public lounge.
Workers can converse and interact with companions in Soma’s virtual office face-to-face through their avatars. They must move to interact with other avatars, there are no chatting or teleport functions.
Like in the real world, the platform is designed to allow users to converse with co-workers in a face-to-face format, enabling everyday conversation and networking that were not possible under existing remote work environments.
Ashley Song (ashley@koreabizwire.com)
