25 June 2024

The Hang Seng University of Hong Kong (HSUHK)’s School of Decision Sciences and Chef Digital Limited have achieved a milestone by developing Hong Kong’s first comprehensive intelligent exhibition management system, known as the “OPlusO Hub: Event Management in the Metaverse” (OPlusO Hub).”

To seamlessly integrate online and offline experiences for both virtual and physical participants, the system incorporates technologies such as Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI), Indoor Positioning Service (IPS), and Blockchain. One notable feature of the system is its use of artificial intelligence to analyse visitor behaviour after an event, providing organisers with more insights to make informed decisions and optimise future events.

The project, supported by the Research Matching Grant Scheme of the University Grants Committee, received over HK$2 million in funding. It has also won the “Sliver Award” at the Geneva International Exhibition of Inventions 2024.

The OPlusO Hub seamlessly connects online and offline activities, enabling individuals who cannot physically attend the event to transcend the constraints of time and locations, and actively engage with the events in the virtual world. Online participants can create personalised “virtual avatars” to enter the metaverse event platform and explore exhibition halls, attend seminars and talks, visit booths, and more. The 24/7 GenAI chatbot service allows participants to ask questions and gain more insights into the exhibition content.

For physical event attendees, the system employs IPS with Augmented Reality (AR) technology to guide visitors to their preferred exhibition areas, and its platform collects extensive data through IPS, including the stay times in each exhibition area and participant preferences. The collected data then assists exhibitors in analysing visitor behaviour and making informed decisions.

After the event, the system visualises corresponding online and offline visitor behaviour, including the number of participants across different times, each participant’s average duration at each exhibition, and total number of participants to analyse the data with Artificial Intelligence and Big Data and compare it with data from previous exhibitions and similar types of events in the market. This comprehensive data analysis helps exhibitors and organisers evaluate future event development plans with the participants’ personal experiences.

Project coordinator, Dr George Ho To-sum, Associate Professor of the Department of Supply Chain and Information Management of HSUHK said “Our team hopes to break through the boundaries of the previous ‘Online to Offline (O2O)’ event management model through research and development by transforming the model to ‘Online Plus Offline (O+O)’, which integrates real and virtual worlds. The new model aims to enhance the visitor experience, improve merchants’ activity management, marketing efficiency, and create unlimited business opportunities.” Dr Ho also hopes to extend the system to other industries such as supermarkets and retail stores in the future, with the aim to assist in analysing customer consumption behaviours.