【TIMELINE】2023/08#2

According to a report from Webmaster Home on August 14th, the well-known American investment firm Ripplewood plans to invest $1 billion in the artificial intelligence software company OpenAI. This investment will leverage products developed by OpenAI, including the chatbot software ChatGPT and the image artificial intelligence software Dall-E. This investment could make Ripplewood a significant financial contributor in the artificial intelligence industry, especially if OpenAI goes public in the future, as Ripplewood's stake in ChatGPT could become quite valuable.

As reported by the Hong Kong Economic Times, Leung Tak Ming, the Senior Manager of Digital Entertainment at Cyberport, stated that there are currently over 170 Web3.0 startups at Cyberport. The Hong Kong government allocated $50 million HKD in the budget for Cyberport to accelerate Web3.0 development. Cyberport is set to disclose more details about the allocation's direction and specific plans this week.

The Spanish football club FC Barcelona has secured a €120 million (€132 million USD) investment from Libero Football Finance AG and Nipa Capital BV for its Web3 project "Barça Vision". FC Barcelona sold a 29.5% stake in the holding company of Barça Vision, Bridgeburg Invest, in exchange for funds. Barça Vision is part of the club's digital Espai Barça strategy, aiming to integrate all digital content around Web3 and blockchain, including NFTs and the metaverse.

Recently, the metaverse platform Roblox released its financial report for the second quarter of 2023. The data shows quarterly revenue of $680.8 million USD, a 15% year-over-year increase. However, the company experienced a net loss of $282.8 million USD, higher than the $176 million USD loss in the same period last year. Additionally, Roblox platform had an average of 65.5 million daily active users, and a monthly average of 13.5 million unique players, both showing a growth of 25% and 19% respectively year-over-year. The total user engagement time in the second quarter was 14 billion hours.

According to a statement from London Art Library Bridgeman Images, the world's most expensive artwork, "Salvator Mundi," is set to be minted as an NFT. The controversial painting was sold for $450.3 million USD at Christie's. Notably, artworks like Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" (1503), Van Gogh's "Starry Night" (1889), Rodin's "The Thinker" (1904), and Monet's "Water Lilies" (1907) have been minted as NFTs. "Salvator Mundi" will be minted by NFT art platform ElmonX in collaboration with Bridgeman Images. The platform previously minted 330 versions of the "Mona Lisa," each priced at £150. Recently, an NFT of the "Mona Lisa" was resold on OpenSea for 3.7 ETH (approximately $6,764 USD).

According to official information, Coca-Cola is issuing a series of NFTs on the Base Chain as part of the Onchain Summer event. This NFT series combines iconic artworks (including "The Scream" and "Girl with a Pearl Earring") with Coca-Cola's distinctive bottle design. The series currently comprises 5 NFTs, with minting prices ranging from 0.0011 ETH to 0.014 ETH, and the event is set to end in 2 days. Earlier on August 4th, Coinbase announced the Onchain Summer event featuring brands like Coca-Cola, Atari, OpenSea, Pixelmon, and Showtime. The theme of the Onchain Summer minting event focuses on "art, music, games," and more, as stated by Coinbase Vice President Max Branzburg.

Recently, the US Department of Defense (DoD) announced the purchase of Havik's VR simulation training system for the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), with a contract value of $19.9 million. As a joint force responsible for overseeing secret operations across the armed forces, USSOCOM requires remote, immersive, and interoperable capabilities. Havik meets these criteria, including the operation alongside military aircraft with the Joint Terminal Attack Controller.

According to IT Home on August 11th, the Kunlun Wanwei Group announced a cooperation agreement between its subsidiary, Tiangong Technology, and global metaverse leader Meta for XR device product development. Tiangong Technology will be responsible for developing the StarMaker VR version of Meta Quest 2 and its iterations. Meta will evaluate and pay business cooperation incentives to Tiangong Technology according to development milestone delivery.

According to UAE media reports on the 14th, Dubai plans to issue business licenses to companies engaged in AI and Web3 businesses to facilitate their operations and attract more investments to the industry. The licenses will be issued by the AI and Web3.0 Campus of the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC). The focus will be on companies providing distributed ledger technology services, professional AI research, and consulting, IT infrastructure builders, technology research and development, and public network services.

A recent study by Bain & Company suggests that the metaverse could be worth $900 billion by 2030, although it might need to remain in the early development stage for another 5 to 10 years. The report indicates that as immersive experiences and collaboration become increasingly important for both consumers and businesses, the metaverse is unlikely to emerge as a singular platform. Industries currently utilizing XR technology include, but are not limited to, entertainment, industrial manufacturing, healthcare, and education and training.

Economists at Goldman Sachs anticipate that the US Federal Reserve will begin interest rate cuts before the end of June 2024 and gradually reduce rates on a quarterly basis from that point. In a report last Sunday, including Jan Hatzius and David Mericle, Goldman Sachs economists stated, "We lower our expectations because once inflation is close to target, we want to normalize the fund rate from restrictive levels. Rate normalization is not a particularly urgent motivation for interest rate cuts, so we also believe that the Federal Open Market Committee will maintain a stable risk. We expect a 25 basis points rate cut per quarter, but the rate of rate cuts is still uncertain. We expect the fund rate to eventually stabilize at 3-3.25%."

According to a report by Analytics India Magazine, the basic daily operating cost for ChatGPT amounts to $700,000. While OpenAI has been trying to achieve profitability with GPT-3.5 and GPT-4, it has not yet generated enough revenue to reach a balanced budget and is still incurring continuous losses. Alongside unfavorable prospects for commercial revenue, the user base for ChatGPT is gradually declining, with a 12% drop in user numbers in July, from 1.7 billion to 1.5 billion.