How Microsoft's Metaverse Stacks Up Against Facebook?

Microsoft Corp MSFT Teams collaboration software users would appear as avatars or animated cartoons in video meetings in the first half of 2022, introducing the metaverse to office life. Now, remote workers can use their avatars to visit virtual workspaces, eventually including replicas of their employers’ offices.

Microsoft’s underlying technology, known as Mesh, aimed to handle far more complex virtual interactions on different types of hardware, from PCs to virtual reality headsets, Financial Times reports. 

Meta Platforms Inc FB co-founder Mark Zuckerberg first promoted metaverse that promises to let users live, work and play within interconnected virtual worlds, followed by a rebranding, Bloomberg reports.

Related Content: Facebook Rebrands As Meta: What Investors Should Know About New Name, Ticker And Vision

Microsoft showcased the new Teams features at the company’s Ignite conference to let businesses create immersive spaces where workers can meet. Microsoft also revealed Dynamics 365 Connected Spaces to let people move and interact within retail and factory spaces. Microsoft revealed Azure OpenAI, a cloud-based service that lets customers use the system’s powerful AI models.

It featured the New Teams features for working and chatting with users and groups outside a particular corporate network. Microsoft also showcased Loop, a new application that operates across different programs to collect files, links, and data from other apps into a single workspace.

While Facebook recently demonstrated a whole virtual reality office experience, with people donning VR goggles to sit in a virtual room alongside avatars of other workers. Contrasting Microsoft’s use of avatars to jumping straight to full virtual reality meetings.

Also, Microsoft saw the adoption of personal avatars as the first step in a progression to see workers become increasingly comfortable with new forms of virtual interaction. “With 250m people around the world using Teams, the introduction of avatars will be the first real metaverse element to seem real,” Teams head Jared Spataro said.

Microsoft would integrate its other productivity software into its new virtual experiences allowing workers to view PowerPoint presentations in the metaverse. Customers can share Office files and features, like PowerPoint decks, in the virtual world.

Microsoft said that its research showed that using personal avatars conveyed a sense of “presence” that made meetings more engaging while freeing workers from constantly appearing before a camera.

Microsoft would use AI to make an avatar’s lips appear to mouth the words and add facial expressions and hand gestures. “You can absolutely expect us to do things in gaming,” Microsoft added.

Price Action: MSFT shares closed higher by 1.14% at $333.13 on the last check Tuesday.