UAE’s Damac Group to build digital cities in metaverse

Dubai: UAE’s Damac Group has announced plans to build its own digital cities as the conglomerate looks to build a presence in the metaverse.

“In an attempt to mold to the progressive trends of business, we are expanding our offerings into the metaverse realm to avail of the many opportunities it presents,” said Damac founder Hussain Sajwani.

“We are keen to pioneer the possibilities that the metaverse offers in ways which allow us to be more connected and involved with our customers and their interests,” said Sajwani.

Metaverse generally refers to shared virtual world environments which people can access via the internet. The term can refer to digital spaces which are made more lifelike by the use of virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR).

Damac Group will be run under the banner ‘D-Labs’ and will be led by Ali Sajwani, CEO of D-Labs and Damac General Manager. The initiative forms part of the company-wide ambitions to move into digital assets and non-fungible tokens (NFT).

The company plans to invest capital of up to $100 million for the project.

“Over the past two years we have been aggressively driving our digitisation efforts, and this new initiative into the metaverse will only further leverage our digital footprint,” said Ali Sajwani. “As well as updating our systems, processes and operations across departments, we have been investing in building a strong team of skilled and talented experts to help support our ambitions of being a digital leader.”