Meta to reportedly lay off 10% of Reality Labs staff

In Brief

Meta is laying disconnected 10% of unit successful its Reality Labs division, which is halfway to processing the company’s VR and metaverse products, the New York Times reported.

The work noted that Reality Labs had astir 15,000 employees, and the occupation cuts could interaction implicit 1,000 people.

Separately, CNBC reported that the institution plans to unopen down studios specified arsenic Armature Studio, Twisted Pixel, and Sanzaru, on with a method portion called Oculus Studios Central Technology, which was moving connected VR titles. Business Insider reported that the company’s CTO and caput of Reality Labs, Andrew Bosworth, called for the “most important” in-person gathering of the twelvemonth connected January 14.

The NYT reported that the occupation cuts would not interaction folks moving connected augmented reality, arsenic the institution has large ambitions to make glasses and controllers. The study besides noted that the wealth saved from these cuts volition beryllium utilized for AR development.

The quality comes arsenic Meta, which changed its full marque from to absorption connected the metaverse successful 2021, is pouring its resources into AI development. In October, the institution moved metaverse caput Vishal Shah to oversee AI products arsenic a vice president, and past year, reorganized to acceptable up its Superintelligence Labs aft poaching Alexandr Wang from Scale AI. The institution went connected to offer apical packages to researchers moving astatine different labs to lure them to articulation Meta.

Meta did not instantly respond to a petition for comment.

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