Meta Cuts Staff In Oculus Studios Division

Facebook parent Meta Platforms has laid off an unspecified number of staff at its loss-making Reality Labs division, which makes wearable devices such as the Oculus headset range and other wearable devices, the company confirmed.

Those laid off numbered more than 100, Bloomberg reported.

The cuts affected Oculus Studios, the company’s in-house games development division for Oculus headsets, as well as staff involved in developing wearable hardware, The Verge and other local media reported.

Metaverse cuts

Supernatural, a VR fitness game, was amongst those affected by the cuts, the Supernatural official Facebook group said.

Meta announced in 2021 it would buy the developer of Supernatural, which allows users to train with fitness experts and coaches while wearing their headsets, in a deal worth $400 million (£300m), but faced antitrust scrutiny from the US Federal Trade Commission.

The company won court approval to buy the game in 2023.

Affected staff will be eligible for new roles at Meta, the company said.

“These changes are meant to help Studios work more efficiently on future mixed-reality experiences for our growing audience,” said a Meta spokesperson in an emailed statement.

Supernatural said in an official Facebook post that it was “deeply saddened” that the changes had led to job cuts, and indicated there would be a reduction in the number of new weekly workout releases.

Meta said it remained “committed to investing in mixed-reality experiences”.

Heavy losses

Reality Labs, whose immersive “metaverse” experiences provided the inspiration for Meta’s name-change from Facebook in 2021, has seen sales of its Ray-Ban-branded smart glasses grow faster than expected.

But Oculus headset sales have remained slow and the unit overall recorded an operating loss of $4.97bn in the fourth quarter of last year alone, while generating $1.1bn in sales, Meta said in January.

Meta in January said it would lay off 5 percent of its staff in what it called performance-related cuts.