Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has denied reports that the company is shifting away from its focus on the metaverse. During an earnings call, Zuckerberg stated that the metaverse remained a “major technology wave” that the company was focused on alongside artificial intelligence (AI), media reports said.
Zuckerberg’s comments come after Meta has faced pressure from shareholders over its investment in the metaverse, with the company’s flagship offering, Horizon Worlds, struggling to gain traction. The platform has attracted only around 200,000 users, compared to the 65 million daily users on rival platform Roblox.
Despite the challenges, Zuckerberg stressed that the metaverse was a “long-term project” for Meta. He noted that more than a billion Meta avatars had been created and that over half of Quest daily actives spent more than an hour using their devices. Quest is Meta’s line of virtual-reality goggles.
While Meta’s metaverse ambitions have faced challenges, the company’s core businesses, which include Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp, have performed well. As a result, Meta beat analysts’ estimates when it reported $28.6 billion in revenue for the fiscal quarter ending in March.
However, Meta’s metaverse division, Reality Labs, has reported significant losses, with $4 billion lost in the first quarter of 2023 alone. In addition, the company has been forced to lay off tens of thousands of employees after hiring aggressively during the pandemic. Last year, Meta reported its first-ever drop in revenue.
Despite the challenges, Zuckerberg remains committed to the metaverse and emphasized during the earnings call that reports of Meta shifting away from the metaverse were “not accurate.”
