South Korea’s Seoul is regarded as the first city in the world to join The Metaverse. Capitalizing on that metaverse future, the Innovation Centre Denmark (ICDK) in collaboration with the Embassy of Denmark organized The Metaverse Tour to Seoul in June 2022. We asked the selected startups how the experience was and what opportunities for the Danish companies lay ahead within The Metaverse ecosystem in Asia.

From Denmark to Seoul:

Innovation Centre Denmark bridges Metaverse ecosystems

South Korea’s Seoul is regarded as the first city in the world to join The Metaverse. Capitalizing on the metaverse future, the Innovation Centre Denmark (ICDK) in collaboration with the Embassy of Denmark in Korea organized a Danish “Metaverse Tour” to Seoul, in June 2022.

This was an Innovation Camp, which is one of ICDK’s main services with the purpose to promote Danish companies' innovation and access to international sources in markets where Innovation Centre Denmark is represented. Participating companies have the opportunity to acquire knowledge, to develop and create contacts with business partners, and to market Danish skills and technologies abroad.

Under the umbrella of the Innovation Camp’s objectives, the ICDK brought Metaverse partners from Danish VR and AI companies, universities and clusters to meet with global tech leaders, investors and entrepreneurs in one of the world-leading hubs for innovation.

This was an opportunity for the participants to learn about the Korean landscape, showcase their digital solutions to global partners and customers, and to network with relevant stakeholders around the Metaverse technologies. We asked the selected startups how the experience was and what opportunities for the Danish companies lie ahead within The Metaverse ecosystem in Asia.

Watch the Innovation Camp Interviews:

Innovation Centre Denmark

"We gathered a bunch of Danish corporations within the Metaverse space and went with them to Seoul to explore their possibilities out there and expose themselves to a whole series of potential Korean partners.“

Innovation Centre Denmark’s role

Innovation Centre Denmark (ICDK) is a partnership between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark and the Ministry of Higher Education and Science in Denmark. ICDK’s main objective is to elevate the Danish innovation ecosystem and bolster Denmark’s competitiveness, prosperity, and green transition.

The centers are located in Bangalore, Boston, Munich, Seoul, Shanghai, Silicon Valley, and Tel Aviv. ICDK retrieves the knowledge from these global innovation hotspots and brings it to the Danish innovation ecosystem in the form of different services including Innovation Camps, Innovation Sparring, tailored counseling, assistance, and knowledge sharing, i.e. reports ”Outlooks”.

Simultaneously, ICDK aims to also take Danish ideas abroad, while creating business and market opportunities and building up relations between Danish and world-leading innovation entrepreneurs, companies, research institutes, universities and funding agencies.

The Innovation Camp in Seoul facilitated the opportunity for Danish companies to promote themselves and connect with international markets, which thematically focused on the ecosystem within the Metaverse space.

New opportunities in Seoul for Kanda

"Having ICDK to faciliate these meetings, assist us with translation and make us understand the Korean business culture, and how we could approach them in a respectful manner, I think that was really valuable"

Kanda was one of the Danish delegation’s representatives to join the “Metaverse tour” in South Korea. The ICDK’s program provided Kanda with good networking opportunities, 1:1 meetings and webinars, where they had the possibility to tell about their offerings. On top of that, they got exposed to big Korean and international companies, which has fit Kanda’s current efforts on expanding to a new market.

Kanda is a software company based in Aarhus that uses Virtual Reality (VR) and elements from computer games to create immersive and human-centered digital learning applications.

They have developed a VR training platform that enables companies to build complex, real-time, and collaborative training simulations within the heavy industries mainly focused on maritime, renewable energy and healthcare sectors.

The Kanda platform can be accessed using VR headsets, desktops and tables allowing employees to train remotely. The overall objective of the high-quality and sustainable VR training is to help companies to save money and reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with onsite training.

Kanda considers having a physical presence in Korea and opening the office in the foreseeable future.

“I think that's the conclusion. If you want to do business, if you want to have a valuable collaboration with companies in South Korea, you need to be there. You need to understand their culture, you need to understand how to operate, how to deal with Korean companies respectfully,” says Lene Thirup, the Business Development Director at Kanda.

Rokoko’s potential expansion

“We had a fantastic trip, and it was super exciting to engage with the whole delegation. We also met development partners in the Metaverse industry, which is a new and beautiful kind of engaging industry.”

Rokoko joined the Danish Metaverse delegation to connect with the Korean market and companies with cutting-edge technology. Apart from networking, they wanted to explore whether there was an interest in future collaborations from the Korean side in the Danish Metaverse solutions, but also to get inspiration from Korean.

Rokoko is a startup based in Copenhagen with teams located in Athens and San Francisco. Their vision is to provide access to quick, non-intrusive, and intuitive tools to all creative teams.

“A whole new generation of content creators popping up to do content for music videos, video games, small social media pitches, and they never had an access to motion capture before,” explains Matias Søndergaard, the Co-founder and Chief Product Officer at Rokoko.

Rokoko designed and produced the motion capture solution Smartsuit Pro that has been shipped to more than 100 countries. They also launched Smartgloves for finger tracking and the Motion Library, which is the world’s largest marketplace of motion assets.

Rokoko is continuously expanding its software suite with new and exciting animation features. Whether it is a one-man indie creator or a big animation production company, Rokoko tools are being used by creators with a variety of skill levels across the world. Matias Sønderggard explains further:

“We are looking to expand and make a new office in Asia, and we want to learn about the culture and the business setup in Seoul. So, we met with relevant resellers, business partners and investors in Seoul.”

What are the opportunities for Danish companies in The Metaverse space?

“I think from the Danish or the Nordic perspective, we can really learn from Asia and look into how they are developing The Metaverse in i.e. Seoul. It’s good to have a little bit of knowledge sharing and see how we can all gain knowledge, experiences, and best practice from each other.

What are the opportunities for
Danish companies in The Metaverse space?

Hundreds of companies worldwide, from seed-stage startups to tech giants, are finding their places in The Metaverse already. What does even metaverse mean and why is there so much fuss about it?

Sofie Hvitved is one of the leading experts in the development of the Metaverse, the Futurist and Head of Media at the Copenhagen Institute for Future Studies.

She explains:

“There is a general consensus that the Metaverse is the convergence of our physical and virtual lives. So a lot of our lives will be in this sort of mix of physical and virtual and the physical. It’s going to be very interesting how that will impact our lives.”

Sofie talks about the young generation and how they value their experience in the virtual world today and concludes:

“I think this will somehow transcend into how all of us are going to experience this move towards the virtual world. And this is something that's kind of a very big mind shift, but it’s something to be very aware of as a company.”

Innovation Centre Denmark gives you access to global research and innovation

Innovation Camp – The Metaverse Tour is just one example of one of the many services Innovation Centre Denmark offers Danish research and innovation actors including companies, SME’s and researchers.

All 7 centers offer tailored programmes, counseling and in-depth knowledge both about the global innovation hotspot the centers are located in as well as selected thematic areas; Green transition, digitalization and emerging technologies as well as life science and health.

ICDK has partnered with TechBQQ and will once again be participating at this year’s summit on September 14 and 15 in the heart of Copenhagen at Lokomotivværkstedet. Innovation Centre Denmark is excited about meeting many inspiring companies, which are welcome to stop by their booth to hear more about relevant programmes, the different centers and current projects.

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