Meta Shifts Its Metaverse Focus to Gaming

As rumors of employees reductions proceed, Meta’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, intends to redirect consideration from the metaverse towards gaming by its VR/AR division Actuality Labs.

The massive tech ignited a mass spherical of layoffs again in November 2022. Final month, as a part of Meta’s yr of effectivity, Zuckerberg introduced one other spherical which is able to start on Could 22 and lead to 10,000 extra layoffs. Many initiatives inside Actuality Labs can be dissolved. In the meantime, different firm groups engaged on gaming initiatives must be on the protected aspect for now.

In keeping with Enterprise Insider, there’s been a latest surge in pleasure amongst Zuckerberg and different high executives at Meta for the gaming trade. Nevertheless, their enthusiasm for the metaverse has seemingly taken a again seat. The corporate has additionally been revamping {hardware} elements to boost the gaming expertise on Quest headsets.

Meta’s Actuality Labs additionally shifted its consideration to gaming, which marks a departure from Zuckerberg’s preliminary imaginative and prescient for the Quest headset to be a tool for productiveness.

Zuckerberg noticed digital actuality as a brand new world for socializing, work, and commerce, with avatars as the first mode of interplay in Meta’s metaverse platform, Horizon Worlds. Nevertheless, the avatars in Horizon Worlds have been criticized for his or her cartoonish look, and the product has struggled to achieve widespread adoption. Meta’s final official replace on its utilization in February 2022 reported having solely 300,000 month-to-month customers.

With these modifications, Meta hopes to see a unique turnaround this yr and presumably improve income. In February, the corporate reported that Actuality Labs suffered an working lack of over $13 billion for 2022, leading to a serious monetary blow for Meta.

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