Irish virtual reality company Engage XR has unveiled its new artificial intelligence-powered “virtual employee” product, which it says will be able to provide “always-on customer service” to the company’s enterprise clients within the metaverse.
In a stock exchange filing on Monday, the Waterford-based company said the avatar – named Athena “after the Greek goddess associated with wisdom, handicraft, and practical reason” – is powered by open artificial intelligence (AI) programmes including Chat GPT-3 and DALL. E.
“Athena is a fully interactive virtual employee who will take voice commands and complete tasks,” Engage said in the filing. “AI-powered avatars open many possibilities for enterprise clients of the Metaverse, including delivery of always-on customer service and the ability to build virtual worlds using nothing other than voice commands.”
The company offers virtual communications solutions through its proprietary software platform. It provides users with a platform for creating, sharing and delivering VR content for education, training and online events.
Engage chief executive David Whelan said: “Even at this very early stage of development, you can hold full conversations with Athena inside Engage. For example, you can ask her to create unique art installations which are built in real-time. She can complete tasks such as fetching 3D models, videos based on your prompts and provide full tutorials and information on almost any topic you ask her. Athena is impressive and only gets better the more we interact with her.”
Engage said it envisages building bespoke “virtual employees” for its enterprise clients “at a premium” in the future.
Revenues at the company rose 41 per cent in the first half of last year, reaching €1.76 million, according to its most recent trading update, issued last September.
Revenue for the Engage platform accounted for 83 per cent of that, and at €1.46 million was 62 per cent higher year-on-year.
