If you're looking for ways to further expand your virtual life in the metaverse, maybe consider fostering a dog.
Pet food maker Pedigree is offering metaverse users a chance to foster a pet from the real world — in the comfort of the virtual one. It's being dubbed as the 'FOSTERVERSE' and the goal of the virtual activation is to find sheltered pets forever homes.
In order to be eligible for virtual fostering, a user must be a "landowner" on the metaverse platform Decentraland. Landowners will be given access to the pet adoption site 'Adopt a Pet' and will be able to choose the furry friend they want. Those that do not own land can still interact with pets but cannot adopt.
As part of the activation, Pedigree is also set to match donations to its Pedigree Foundation up to $100,000. The organization specifically focuses on helping dogs find forever homes.
Jean-Paul Jansen, the vice president of marketing for Mars Petcare North America, said that virtual fostering is an expansion of the company's mission to end pet homelessness.
"Both the Pedigree brand and Pedigree Foundation have long histories of supporting animal shelters and promoting dog adoption, and this program enables people to support deserving dogs in a new way through virtual fostering," he said in a statement.
One of Europe's leading micromobility providers, TIER mobility, is expanding into North America after acquiring the micromobility operator, Spin. Ford Motor Company previously owned Spin but is now selling the company to TIER Mobility, which says the deal will make it the largest multimodal micromobility operator in the world in terms of the number of cities it operates in and the number of vehicles in its fleet. Lawrence Leuschner, CEO of TIER Mobility, and Ben Bear, CEO of Spin, join Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
Digital consulting company Publicis Sapient has its sights set on the Metaverse. The subsidiary of the French advertising giant Publicis Group is announcing a new partnership with NFT auction house Portion in an effor to help brands deliver experiences in the metaverse, including the sales of products. Publicis Sapient CEO Nigel Vaz joined Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss. "In the context of our collaboration with Portion, the first experience that we created was with Decentraland, which is a virtual world," he said. "And car manufacturers in this metaverse, in terms of their buyers, can interact with a virtual person, (and) they can view quality NFTs. They can examine a virtual vehicle, be inside the car, rev an engine, open doors, all without leaving their homes."
Identity and access management company ForgeRock looks to use pattern recognition and artificial intelligence to ease secure access for users as an alternative to just password management. CEO Fran Rosch joined Cheddar News to discuss how the company's services work. "I mean, who likes to set up and use a new password? And they're also really bad security because a lot of people repeat the same one and use it everywhere and use the simplest one possible," he said. "We're trying to really create a smarter better identity system where we can find different ways, smarter ways, of recognizing you as a user and giving you access to what you need by really eliminating the password altogether."
Ford announced today that it will be separating its electric vehicles business from its internal combustion engine vehicles in two divisions named Ford Model E and Ford Blue, respectively. Ford Motor Company CFO John Lawler joined Cheddar to discuss the decision-making behind the restructuring. "When you think about the expertise that Ford has in like body structural engineering, chassis engineering, manufacturing at scale, there isn't an EV startup company out there that wouldn't love to have our capabilities in that space," he said.
Amazon is confirming it’s closing all of its physical bookstores as well as its 4-star shops and pop up locations as the online behemoth reworks its physical footprint.
As Russia continues to invade Ukraine, its tech outsourcing sector is at risk. Over the past few years, the country has become a popular outsourcing destination for American and European tech companies, but now the future of that industry is uncertain. Isabelle Bousquette, enterprise technology reporter, for The Wall Street Journal, discusses what repercussions the crisis might have on the industry, and what companies are doing to mitigate possible disruptions.
