Virtual worlds are increasingly foundational infrastructure for Europe's economy and society: they shorten development cycles in industry and manufacturing, improve safety and efficiency in the energy and mobility sectors, enable realistic training environments for education and healthcare, and accelerate scientific experiments through collaborative simulations. In this way, they make an important contribution to productivity gains, new high-tech jobs, and resilient value chains—based on European values such as openness, trust, and sustainability. The VWA sees itself as a central platform for accelerating research, innovation, and the application of virtual worlds in Europe.

With Leif Oppermann, expert for "Mixed and Augmented Reality Solutions" at the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology FIT, Fraunhofer provides one of the vice-presidents of the new association. For the Fraunhofer ICT Group, the VWA thus opens up an ideal platform for positioning and networking research and development activities in the fields of virtual worlds, digital twins, simulation, and related key technologies across Europe and translating them into joint projects.

Worth reading:
Call for openness, interoperability, and European values in technology development

In terms of content, the founding of the Virtual Worlds Association ties in with the journal article "From the metaverse to virtual worlds" by Leif Oppermann and Dietmar Laß, which was published on December 12, 2025. From a decidedly European perspective, the article advocates for open, interoperable virtual worlds that strengthen Europe's democratic values, cultural contexts, and digital sovereignty, thus providing important impetus for the strategic orientation of research and development within the association.

The VWA creates a central hub for pooling and sustainably expanding Europe's technological strengths. The association is open to new members from industry, research, and technology development.