Meta will initiate staff cuts of more than 1 000 people within its Reality Labs division.
Facebook-parent company Meta is reportedly in the process of laying off employees focused on virtual reality (VR) within its Reality Labs division.
This comes on the back of last April’s report that Meta would lay off “an unspecified number of employees” from its Reality Labs division “amid ongoing restructuring efforts”.
CNBC has reported that layoffs, amounting to more than 1 000 jobs, will impact about 10% of the hardware division, which makes Quest VR headsets, and the Horizon Worlds virtual social network.
Reports further note that Meta plans to “refocus on developing wearables, like its recent batch of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered Ray-Ban smart glasses, based on a memo from CTO Andrew Bosworth.
Similarly, Engadget reports the social media giant is also closing down several studios that were working on VR titles. The VR studios that are being shut down include Armature, Sanzaru and Twisted Pixel.
See also
During the height of the pandemic, tech companies saw rapid growth due to increased demand for digital tools, e-commerce, remote work platforms and cloud services. Major firms like Amazon, Meta, Google and Microsoft hired aggressively, expanding their workforces to meet surging demand.
However, as pandemic-related demand waned and economic pressures mounted, tech firms began cutting costs and reducing their workforces.
Analysts also believe AI is partly responsible for the latest job crisis, but not the root cause.
