Flipkart launches Metaverse shopping experience ‘Flipverse’

Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart has announced its latest Web3 offering, a virtual shopping experience for customers to shop interactively called Flipverse.

The project was developed in collaboration with eDAO, a Polygon-backed, media, and entertainment-focused decentralised organisation, to spice up its customer experience during this year’s Diwali festivity.

Available since Monday, the current Flipverse is a trial run of the product meant to test the market response and is only available till Sunday, October 23. Users can access 'gamified, interactive, and immersive' experiences within a 3D-style setting while shopping for goods.

Flipverse visitors can also collect loyalty points and digital collectables as they interact and buy products from any of the 15 partner brands on the virtual platform. Some of the brands available include Puma, Noise, Nivea, Lavie, Tokyo Talkies, Campus, VIP, Ajmal Perfumes, and Himalaya. 

'The idea is to have millions of users experience Flipverse and open the doors to the future of shopping,' Flipkart said.

Even Polygon co-founder Sandeep Nailwal believes Flipkart’s entry into the Metaverse could 'revolutionize online retail as we know it.'

Reportedly, customers can visit Flipverse from any smartphone as the virtual experience is streamed via cloud computing.

'This is a 3D-enabled virtual environment with super high fidelity. We have worked with partners like eDAO to enable this on the server and then stream it on the app so that you get a very high fidelity irrespective of what quality of mobile phone you have,' Sai Krishna VK, chief innovation architect at Flipkart Labs, said during a press briefing.

Although this is Flipkart’s first brush with blockchain-powered virtual experiences, it is not its first foray into the broader Web3. In July, it partnered with the newly-launched Nothing phone to give NFTs to customers who pre-ordered the phone on its app.

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