Facebook held their annual Q3 earnings call late last week, and we found Oculus to be the main point of the conference, and manifesting itself as Facebook’s biggest project to the day. Facebook’s founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, noted that the plans for AR and VR are “taking a bit longer” than expected but they are still planning on the products from Oculus to be a mainstream topic going down the road.
When Zuckerberg was asked about the state of VR and AR in relation to Oculus and Facebook, he said the following:
“On VR and AR, you’re right that this is taking a bit longer than we thought. And I’m still optimistic. I think that the long-term vision and the reasons why I thought this was going to be important and big are unchanged. So we’re seeing a lot of people use these products and love them. And because of that, I think that we’re still going to get there.”
With Facebook Horizons being launched shortly, Facebook’s vision is clear as day going forward. They believe they are still a few years out, and it might be a little more expensive than they thought it would be to mass produce their headsets, but Facebook plans on going through with the plan anyway.
Even though Oculus has been working with Facebook for a few years now, Zuckerberg has admitted that Facebook has never been known as a hardware company, so overcoming that somewhat large obstacle has been a problem for them. He predicts that the problem will become minor in the future, but building the Facebook brand around the Oculus hardware will be “better off when [virtual reality] is really ready to be a completely mainstream thing with hundreds of millions of people using it.”
With those challenges being noticed, the Oculus Quest that is being sold for $400 is being sold just as fast as they are being produced. Zuckerberg said that “The demand has been strong, and the content is starting to pick up, both on the AAA really high-quality side and some of the indie stuff that I think is quite good. I’m just — I’m very excited about what we’re seeing and very optimistic about the future.”
Even with their newest headsets already on the market, the company still has some big releases on the horizon that are going to propel their hardware and software to new heights entering the new calendar year. The Oculus Link, the software technology and hardware that is going to enable the Quest to run as a Rift S, is making its debut in the near future. This is going to make the market for all headsets even more lucrative for the company going forward. This gives PC VR users a reason to buy a standalone headset, knowing that they can also use it away from their home. This gives Quest owners the ability to connect to another person’s computer, giving them a hint at what could be with the power of the real Rift S. The possibilities are endless.
On top of this, Facebook and Oculus have some games and new social media to debut in 2020 as well. Facebook Horizons, the new way to communicate inside of VR is going to take the headset’s social aspect to heights never seen by another VR company. On top of that, the lineup of exclusive games have all VR enthusiasts and common fans excited as well. Asgards Wrath, Stormland, Lone Echo II, and of course the biggest hit, Medal of Honor, are all coming to Oculus headsets exclusively.
It may be taking longer than expected, but Oculus is already on path for a great adoption of virtual reality. For more VR news and community updates, make sure to check back at VRGear.com.
