Ending as of January 14, Next Year
Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook in the United States, is shutting down its augmented reality (AR) studio to focus on the rapidly growing artificial intelligence (AI) technology.
On the 27th (local time), Meta Platforms announced that it will cease operations of the AR studio "Meta Spark" as of January 14, 2025. Meta Spark is a platform that provides tools for anyone to create AR. Meta Platforms first introduced it in 2019 to popularize AR.
Meta Platforms explained, "After thorough review, we decided to prioritize and invest in other businesses." However, Meta Platforms added that it will continue to provide AR effects it has created in-house.
This move has led to analysis that Meta Platforms is effectively focusing on AI rather than the metaverse. Although the company renamed itself from Facebook to Meta Platforms in 2021, signaling the metaverse as its future growth engine, the business viability declined as the non-face-to-face culture faded after the COVID-19 pandemic ended. Meta reportedly incurred losses of about $50 billion in its augmented and virtual reality business through January of this year.
It is also reported that Meta Platforms has recently stopped developing mixed reality (MR) headsets. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta Platforms, stated during the first-quarter earnings announcement that AI will be the largest investment area this year, and the company plans to invest $40 billion in infrastructure to support related technologies such as hardware, data centers, and servers.
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