Rumors of the metaverse’s loss of life abroad might have been a bit untimely, whilst headset-maker Pico appears to be within the doldrums of a moderately anticlimactic 12 months in VR. Phrase on the road was that ByteDance, the China-based firm greatest referred to as the proprietor of TikTok, was trying to get out of the digital actuality recreation.

ByteDance deliberate to finally “abandon” Pico VR, in keeping with analysis agency EqualOcean on Saturday. The agency claimed primarily based on unnamed sources that “the particular person in cost” of Pico—maybe referring to CEO and founder Jarrod Yuster—visited ByteDance’s headquarters the place founder Zhang Yiming informed him the corporate deliberate to finally abandon its VR initiatives.

As famous first by Reuters, one other report from Chinese language outlet The Paper claimed Pico had gone by way of turnover on practically half the unit’s workers, and that execs had been additionally being moved away from ByteDance’s VR arm. The corporate already laid off someplace round 200 staff from Pico again in February.

ByteDance informed Reuters that OpenOcean’s report “just isn’t true.” The TikTok proprietor nonetheless plans to “put money into the prolonged actuality (XR) enterprise over the long run.” Moreover, the corporate mentioned it might “preserve the conventional operation of the product and proceed to boost the funding in product expertise,” seeming to discuss with Pico and VR.

Gizmodo reached out to ByteDance for remark and extra clarification, however we didn’t instantly hear again.

ByteDance purchased Pico, which on the time was the world’s largest VR headset maker, again in 2021. A 12 months later, the corporate revealed its Pico 4 headset that was meant to compete immediately with Meta within the cheap-to-midrange VR house. It additionally revealed final 12 months its Pico 4 Enterprise, a suped-up model of the Pico 4 designed for all these companies which can be contemplating what the world would appear to be if staff labored with VR headsets strapped to their heads for hours on finish.

Pico has but to disclose any new {hardware} since these bulletins. The corporate shared a couple of bundle costs and OpenXR interoperability for extra devs to construct VR apps for Pico, however 2023 has been a 12 months with only a few surprises from what was as soon as thought of considered one of Meta’s greatest rivals within the VR house.

Meta confirmed off its latest $500 Quest 3 headset supporting each digital actuality and augmented actuality by way of full-color passthrough final month. Apple additionally jumped into the fray with its Imaginative and prescient Professional headset set to launch subsequent 12 months. That new “spatial laptop,” because the Tim Cook dinner-led firm retains making an attempt to name it, is gearing as much as be the corporate’s most complex product launch in its historical past. Patrons will have to arrange appointments to get fitted for one, and Apple retailer staff are reportedly getting further coaching for how one can promote the $3,500 headset.