The company once known as Facebook has changed a lot since Mark Zuckerberg said last year that the company would charge the world first. Meta had 11,000 fewer employees and a stock price that plummeted as a result of a tech downturn. During that time, Meta burned over $10 billion into its metaverse vision with little to show for it save avatars with legs that barely work and a $1,500 headset. John Carmack, the legendary engineer who lent his ear to Meta, recently decided to stop working. The company says it will burn more money in the new year. In a post titled, "Why we still believe in the future," Meta Chief Technology Officer Andrew Bosworth acknowledged the financial challenges but said the company would still dump 20% of the company's overall costs and expenses into the Reality Labs segment of its business next year. According to Insider Intelligence, the single division that is responsible for Meta's headsets and future facing metaverse platforms lost $9.4 billion this year. This year was even harder than we anticipated, and we never thought it would be easy. The economic challenges and pressures on Meta's core business created a perfect storm of skepticism about the investments we're making. He argued that short-term thinking would limit companies only to invest in expensive products during boom times. The executive said that the metaverse plans are not going away. After one of the hardest years in the history of the company, Meta is still committed to its vision for the future.
Reality Labs engineers succeeded in developing a product that put a piece of advanced hardware in the hands of developers, according to Bosworth. The popularity of social experiences on the Quest Store is proof that people are interested in hanging on to their headsets. The executive said that Meta wants to focus more on ways to help the developers succeed in the future. Apple and its long-rumored headset are most likely to be the next competitors.
We will continue to find ways to work more efficiently, but what won't change is our vision and the long-term research effort we're undertaking to get there.
The reassuring tone flies in the face of a growing chorus of frustrated investors and external critics Brad Gerstner, the founder of Altimeter Capital, wrote an open letter to Facebook's CEO saying that Meta haddrifted into the land of excess.
Enthusiasm is leaving the company. John Carmack quit his job at Meta this week. Carmack said in the memo that the teams working on the hardware were constantly self-sabotage and wasted effort.
Carmack thinks that the organization is operating at half the effectiveness that would make him happy.
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