TikTok Owner's VR Headset Company Pico Lays Off Hundreds of Staff: Report

ByteDance, the China-based company that owns TikTok as well as one of the biggest overseas VR makers, Pico, is taking a long look at its VR headset business, finding that all those metaverse champions were way too “optimistic” in their estimation that virtual reality would take over the world.

WatchHands-On With Meta Quest 3 CCShare SubtitlesOffEnglishPico’s hardware team will be moving on to making new technology. Still, the company is slashing and burning its software team, cutting staff or folding them back into ByteDance’s larger product development team. The anonymous sources told Reuters the headset maker could cut “hundreds” of jobs. Gizmodo reached out to ByteDance for comment and clarification on job cuts, but we did not immediately hear back.Advertisement“The VR industry remains in a very early stage,” Hongwei reportedly told staff while noting it could lay off sales, videos, and platform operation staff.AdvertisementLast month, Pico was telling anybody who would listen that Meta Quest 2 headset.Pico reportedly laid off around 200 staff back in February.AdvertisementIf the VR industry is still in its early stages, then companies like Meta will need to spend billions of dollars more to see their reported $3.7 billion in third-quarter losses for its VR-focused Reality Labs division at the end of last month. That brings the division to $21 billion in losses since the start of 2022.

Based on reporting by gizmodo.com.