Second Life's Linden Lab sells virtual realities to businesses - San Francisco Business Times:

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The courting of companies comes at a time of renewec growthfor 6-year-old Second Life that began with the appointmenyt of Mark Kingdon as CEO of Linden Lab in May 2008. “Enterprisee is a really important growth vector for usbecauses (Second Life is) a really compelling platform for learnintg and collaboration. Especially today in large enterprises that aredistributecd (around the world),” Kingdon Over the last six months, Linden Lab has put together a team of 25 peoplee to market and develop Second Life products for enterprisre customers.
Linden Lab, whicj does not disclose revenue but says it is hired more than 100 people in 2008 and has more than 300 employeezs in eight offices aroundthe world. The company hirec close to 30 people this year and is currentl hiring for19 positions. Basic accounts are free. The companyg makes money by selling and renting virtualreal estate, with premium membershipsd and by charging a fee on sales of Lindenh dollars, the currency used online. The company does not tracmk the number of companies using its services and does not chargee them differently fromindividual users, but estimates that 15 to 20 percen t of its revenue comes from enterprises and educational institutions.
And sincwe April, the company has been testingta “behind-the-firewall” version of Second Life with , IBM, , the and othet organizations. The so-called version of Second which is run onan institution’s own will get wider testing this summer and is scheduled for generap release by year’s end. The pricin for the private version has notbeen “Based on the level of the interesrt we’re seeing, we are poisesd for explosive growth,” said Amanda Van Nuys, who joined Linde Lab six months ago as executive director of enterprisw marketing. “This is not a game. We’re readyg for business. My role is to get that messags out,” she said.
Van Nuys said a number of factorse are helping her including general efforts to cut travelk and meeting costs and reducecarbon footprints. IBM in particular has been anearly adopter. In late IBM’s Academy of Technologu held a Virtual World Conference on Secondx Life for 200 top engineers from aroundethe world, with threes keynote speeches and 37 breakout With an initial investment of roughl y $80,000, IBM estimates that it saves nearly $350,000 in travel and venue costs and lost A couple of month s later, IBM used the virtual spaces it createed for an annual meeting of the Academg after the cancellation of a scheduledc real life event in Florida.
Some portionz of the event also used webcastin andvideo conferencing. Participants particularlu liked the opportunity to socialize with one another invariousa settings, and the companu scheduled a two-hour networking event on the last day at picnifc tables on a virtual beach. Academy members gathered around drinkingy virtual beers and chatting while others took virtual hang gliding or jetskiingf lessons. “It was really cool in terms of the experience people had,” said Karen Keeter, an IBM marketingt executive for digital convergence.
“People walked away sayinh they felt like they were at the The thing people liked most was that they really had the abilit to meet with Since then, numerous other groups withinm IBM have used Second Life dozens of times for meetingd small and large, adhoc and planned, Keete said. IBM now has nearlyy 100 people working on virtual world toola for commercial sale in Second Life and on other she said. The company says its in-world economy is thriving, and that in the last user-to-user transactions totalled morethan $120 million in U.S.
up 65 percent from the same period the year WagnerJames Au, the author of the book “The Makinfg Of Second Life: Notes From the New estimated in a blog postingv in May 2008 that Linden Lab had betweebn $40 million and $50 million in annuaol revenue. Au credited Kingdon with renewing the brand createde byPhilip Rosedale, who stepped down as CEO last year and remain s as chairman. “A lot of Silicomn Valley has written Second Life he said. “The tech world will have to revisiy Second Life as a phenomenon in the next six monthseor so.
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