China’s Zhejiang Sets Up Metaverse Association To Promote Growth

China’s province of Zhejiang announced the formation of a metaverse association to enhance innovation and growth in this sector.

Province’s officials said the launch of the metaverse association comes within a framework of luring investments of leading metaverse development and Web3 companies to the province. Already, Chinese companies such as NetEase and a subsidiary of China Mobile joined the association, which is called the Zhejiang Metaverse Industry Association.

The metaverse association, which is based in the province’s capital of Hangzhou, started operations with 91 local firms as the officials pointed out that they look forward to growing the number of companies by 200 before the end of 2025. It will be supervised by the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Economy and Information Technology and chaired by Chinese Academy of Engineering Professor Tan Jiangrong.

Tan said that the association eyes launching seven committees, four centers, and an expert think tank to accelerate the adoption of virtual worlds in the province. The seven committees will explore ways of deploying the metaverse in the sectors of education, medicine, consumption, community, e-commerce, economy, and cultural tourism.

The association also plans to help the government in formulating metaverse industry development plans in cooperation with the regulators for their enforcement.

It is noticeable that there is a heated race among Chinese provinces in the metaverse arena as each province attempts to outline outstanding metaverse strategies or initiatives. For an example, Shanghai aims to generate $6.5 billion (50 billion yuan) annually from culture and tourism metaverse projects by 2025.

The metaverse industry in China is flourishing as it is expected to hike by about 40% this year, according to a new report. According to a recent report by Research and Market, the world’s largest market research store, on the Chinese metaverse market and its future, the metaverse industry in China is predicted to increase by 39.5% on an annual basis to reach $1,06,102.8 million in 2023.