The sector is supposed to be the next pillar of the company's hardware offerings, next to the iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and Macs.

Apple could unveil the headset late this year or early next year and launch it later in 2023.Įarlier reports already provided many details of Apple's VR and mixed reality ambitions. Reports over the last year have suggested that the Cupertino giant had to delay the device's unveiling, but this presentation indicates an advanced development stage. On Thursday, anonymous sources told Bloomberg that Apple executives recently demonstrated a headset with VR and AR functionality to its board of directors. However, the latest information suggests that the company is close to having a tangible product to compete with offerings from Valve, HTC, Meta, and Sony. Ironically, many of the company’s North American customers I’ve chatted with over the years seem to have at least partially opted for Pico headsets over Oculus hardware due to general weariness of Facebook’s data and ads-dependent business models, which they fear Oculus will eventually become a larger part of.In brief: Reports of Apple's work on virtual reality hardware go back several years. With Pico finding its home now at ByteDance, two of the world’s largest virtual reality brands now reside inside social media companies. Pico may not hold the same name recognition as Oculus or HTC, but the company is a top VR hardware maker, selling to consumer audiences in China and enterprise customers in the Western world. Unlike Oculus, they have a substantial presence in China. Like Oculus, they create both hardware and software for their VR devices.

Pico had raised some $62 million in venture funding from Chinese firms, including a $37 million Series B in March. The deal first reported on by Bloomberg last week was confirmed by the company on Monday, though ByteDance didn’t disclose a price tag for the deal. After taking over the mantle of most-downloaded social media app in the world with TikTok, ByteDance is coming for Facebook’s moonshot, buying up its own virtual reality headset maker called Pico. TikTok parent company ByteDance seems to be looking to one-up Facebook anywhere it can.

Virtual reality mac hardware