Suzhou joins other areas to serve as metaverse hub in China

A Chinese city has declared ambitions to establish itself as a center of research and development for virtual reality and to lure more than 200 enterprises into the sector by 2025. Jiangsu Province, in China’s eastern Yangtze valley, has the 12 million-person metropolis of Suzhou.

By 2025, Suzhou plans to have constructed 30 model metaverse application scenarios, with a concentration on the fields of healthcare, tourism, education, and local government. The cost of the city’s proposal has yet to be made public.

The company estimates that the metaverse-related industries will be worth 200 billion yuan (US$29.77 billion) by 2025, despite the fact that they will be fiercely competitive with their Chinese counterparts.

Additionally, it is anticipated that Shanghai, the nation’s financial hub, will foster the growth of metaverse industries in the future and introduce its first metaverse industrial fund in December 2022, with a target investment target of 1 billion yuan (US$149 million).

A number of Chinese provinces, including Beijing, Guangzhou, Chongqing, and Jinan, as well as the provinces of Zhejiang and Henan, have all developed plans for metaverse development.

As far as other Asian countries go, South Korea has also committed to developing metaverse technology and plans to be among the top five nations by the year 2026. Earlier this year, there was the launch of a new service under the name Metaverse Seoul that allows residents of Seoul to take advantage of the technology through a digital platform.