Ford, the American car manufacturer, is jumping on the Metaverse bandwagon, according to its recent trademark applications.
The auto giant has submitted 19 separate trademarks for all of its key brands.
The Dearborn, Michigan-based company intends to offer virtual cars, trucks, vans and clothing.
It also has plans for online stores with non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
As reported by U.Today, South Korea's car giant Hyundai also filed several trademark applications related to the Metaverse and non-fungible tokens. Its filings extend to sports gear, headgear, footwear, eyewear, sports equipment and other items.
Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai, Lamborghini, Bentley and other major car manufacturers have also issued their own NFT collections.
Luxury hypercar manufacturer W Motors entered into the Metaverse space in August.
Earlier this week, Renault Korea, the South Korean subsidiary of the French auto manufacturer, and The Sandbox, a popular Metaverse platform, introduced virtual automobile experiences.
In the meantime, Alfa Romeo built NFTs into its vehicles to store maintenance records.
While automakers are entering the NFT space at a rapid pace, it is not clear whether or not this Metaverse fever will produce strong use cases.
NFT cars are more expensive than real ones
A recent research article published by Vanarama shows that some NFT aficionados are willing to pay more for virtual cars than real ones. An image of the Nissan GT-R car was sold for a whopping $2.3 million, which is 10 times higher than the cost of the actual car. A video of a detonating Lamborghini was recently sold for $250,000 as an NFT, which also exceeds the value of a real Lambo.
Vladislav Sopov
Dan Burgin