conjures images of gamers with headsets, friends hanging out in a virtual world, or perhaps even a new kind of online meeting. Nokia, however, is envisioning the metaverse differently. The company is putting what it calls the “industrial metaverse,” at the center of its corporate strategy. The goal is tomap out their industrial systems and determine the most efficient ways to operate them, saving costs, accelerating innovations, and—if used right—reducing emissions.
“Sustainability is the other side of efficiency and productivity,” says Thierry Klein, president of Nokia Bell Labs Solutions Research. At the core of digitization’s impact on emissions is efficiency: these technologies can cut down on waste and reduce operating costs. This ranges from the relatively simple use of it to adjust lighting and temperatures in the office, to complex system modeling, as with the industrial metaverse. “Digital allows you to do things at scale, in a way that you couldn’t do in a traditional process,” says Aamir Paul, North America president at Schneider Electric.