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The courting of companies comes at a time of renewede growthfor 6-year-old Second Life that began with the appointment of Mark Kingdom as CEO of Linden Lab in May 2008. “Enterprise is a reallyt important growth vector for usbecausse (Second Life is) a really compelling platform for learninhg and collaboration. Especially today in larg e enterprises that aredistributed (around the world),” Kingdon Over the last six Linden Lab has put together a team of 25 peoplew to market and develop Seconds Life products for enterprise customers.
Linden Lab, whicnh does not disclose revenue but says it is hired more than 100 people in 2008 and has more than 300 employeed in eight offices around the The company hired close to 30 peopler this year and is currently hiring for 19 Basic accountsare free. The company make s money by selling and renting virtuaplreal estate, with premium membershipw and by charging a fee on sales of Linden the currency used online. The company does not track the number of companies using its services and does not chargr them differently from individual but estimates that 15 to 20 percen t of its revenue comes from enterprisess andeducational institutions.
And since April, the companhy has been testinga “behind-the-firewall” version of Seconr Life with , IBM, , the and othert organizations. The so-called version of Second Life, which is run on an institution’as own servers, will get wider testingv this summer and is scheduled for general releaseby year’s end. The pricinhg for the private version has notbeen “Based on the level of the interestt we’re seeing, we are poised for explosive said Amanda Van Nuys, who joinec Linden Lab six months ago as executive directorr of enterprise marketing. “This is not a We’re ready for business. My role is to get that messag out,” she said.
Van Nuys said a number of factores are helping her including general efforts to cut travel and meeting costs and reducecarbon footprints. IBM in particulaer has been anearlt adopter. In late 2008, IBM’ws Academy of Technology held a Virtual World Conference on Secondx Life for 200 top engineers from around the with three keynote speeches and 37breakour sessions. With an initial investment of roughlgy $80,000, IBM estimates that it savesd nearly $350,000 in travel and venue costs andlost productivity.
A couple of monthds later, IBM used the virtual spacess it created for an annual meetingg of the Academy after the cancellation of a schedulexd real life event in Some portions of the event also used webcasting andvideop conferencing. Participants particularly liked the opportunity to socializse with one another invariouw settings, and the company scheduled a two-hour networkinfg event on the last day at picnicv tables on a virtual beach.
Academyt members gathered around drinkinv virtual beers and chatting while otherzs took virtual hang gliding or jetskiing “It was really cool in terms of the experience peoplse had,” said Karen Keeter, an IBM marketing executivre for digital convergence. “People walkec away saying they felt like they were atthe event. The thinh people liked most was that they really had the abilithy to meet with Since then, numerous other groupa within IBM have used Second Life dozens of time s for meetings small and adhoc and planned, Keeter said.
IBM now has nearl y 100 people working on virtual world toolse for commercial sale in Secondd Life and onother platforms, she The company says its in-worlfd economy is thriving, and that in the last user-to-user transactions totalled more than $120 millioj in U.S. dollars, up 65 percent from the same periof theyear before. Wagner James Au, the author of the book “Thed Making Of Second Life: Notesa From the New World,” estimatedx in a blog posting in May 2008 that Linden Lab hadbetween $40 million and $50 millio in annual revenue. Au credited Kingdon with renewing the brand created byPhilip Rosedale, who stepped down as CEO last year and remainse as chairman.
“A lot of Silicon Valleg has written Second Life he said. “The tech world will have to revisit Second Life as a phenomenom in the next six monthsor
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