NEW DELHI: As Meta (formerly Facebook) continues to bet big on gaming, it has lost close to $4 billion on its augmented reality/virtual reality (AR-VR) division.
The Mark Zuckerberg-run company showed continued losses in its AR/VR Reality Labs division in its latest quarterly results.
The company is losing money at a rate of more than $1 billion per month since June 2022 on its AR/VR dream, according to GamesIndustry.biz.
“We continue to expect operating losses to increase meaningfully year-over-year due to our ongoing product development efforts and our investments to further scale our ecosystem, ” according to the company.
Meta CFO Susan Li said on the Q1 earnings call that “We continue to expect operating losses to increase meaningfully year-over-year”.
Meta’s Reality Labs recorded $440 million in revenue but an overall loss of $3.85 billion.
“The initial signs are quite positive here. But building the leading AI will also be a larger undertaking than the other experiences we've added to our apps, and this is likely going to take several years, ” said Zuckerberg.
Meta captured 59 per cent of the Extended Reality (XR) headset market in 2023.
Notably, Meta strategically lowered the price of its existing Quest 2 throughout the year, making it an attractive option for budget-conscious consumers, especially during the holiday season, according to Counterpoint Research.
This strategy helped Meta maintain its lead until the launch of Quest 3 in Q4 2023.