April 3, local time, is the 10th anniversary of Meta's XR business unit, Reality Labs, Meta, which acquired Oculus ten years ago, posted a review of this journey and looks forward to the future.
The following is the original text of the compilation:
We're on the edge of the next computing platform, one that ultimately focuses on people, not products. We've been working towards this moment for the past decade, making significant R&D investments in AI and the metaverse to help lead the next wave of human-centered computing. Our products, including the Meta Quest 3 and Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses, have changed the way millions of people experience the world.
1. We've brought your hand to virtual reality (with or without a controller).
2. We invented Inside-Out tracking so that people can explore new worlds with wireless tethering.
3. We offer you eye tracking and natural facial expressions for less than $2000.
4. We let you seamlessly blend the virtual and physical worlds for the price of about one console.
5. We've done it all with a community of developers, creators, and dreamers. Their collective passion and perseverance have turned reality into virtual, augmented, and mixed reality.
Today, Reality Labs celebrates the last 10 years of metaverse and AI work and looks to the future.
"Virtual reality used to be a dream of science fiction, but the internet was also a dream, as were computers and smartphones. The future is coming, and we have the opportunity to create it together. ”
It's now 10 years since Mark Zuckerberg announced the acquisition of Oculus and started advancing his metaverse vision in earnest. It's a decade of investment in Reality Labs, including future research, ongoing product development, and a large number of prototypes.
If you've been following Reality Labs for a while, you're probably familiar with Chief Scientist Michael Abrash. It has always been clear to him that MR and AR will be the successors to the PC – a vision he and Zuckerberg share.
"No matter where people are in the world, they can be together face-to-face and not separated by distance," Abrash said. I don't have to work on one screen, I can have many screens and then I can share it with you from any angle, I can switch workspaces with one click, our avatars can collaborate as if we were in the same room, and use tools like virtual whiteboards that are better than their real-world counterparts. I joined Meta for obvious reasons, XR is going to change the world, and Mark Zuckerberg sees the same future and makes a decision, so the resources are going to be there, and that's really going to happen. ”
Today, we look back and celebrate a decade of innovation, thankful to the people who believed in the field long before it became mainstream, and the community that made it all possible.
Step into the Rift
It all started with a development kit and a dream...... As well as a large amount of tape. More than 9,000 enthusiasts have collectively contributed a total of $2.4 million to help make this dream a reality. From DK1 to DK2, the Oculus team took people from the living room to the top of a skyscraper and looked directly into the eyes of a T-Rex – and they were just getting started.
In March 2016, Rift ushered in the modern era of VR, followed by our first generation of Touch controllers in December of the same year. With its ergonomic design that encourages natural hand posture and interaction, Touch opens up a whole new world of possibilities, such as climbing a cliff face with your own hands in The Climb and casting spells with gestures in The Mage's Tale.
It was a time when dedicated VR rooms and often complex sensor setups were required, until the launch of the Rift S in May 2019, incorporating Inside-Out tracking technology, first introduced by Quest, to eliminate the need for external sensors. We are now investing more than ever in PCVR, including Air Link, remote desktop, and more. But we saw the freedom that wireless discrete headsets could provide, so we cut the power cord and went all-in-one.
Mobile VR
Go was our first standalone VR product, launched in 2018 to allow users to experience VR in the simplest way possible. Starting at $199, it offers significantly improved visual clarity while also reducing the screen window effect that occurs on the Rift.
As an early product of the media and entertainment experiences that people know and love on the Quest, the Go gives people a front-row seat to concerts, movies, sporting events, and more, while also allowing them to hang out with friends in ways that are simply not possible with smartphones. The experience only gets better after we add Quest's 3DoF tracking and improved optics and displays to Go's 6DoF.
We've partnered with Xiaomi to launch Go and Xiaomi VR built specifically for the Chinese market globally. Go also marks the beginning of our multi-year partnership with Qualcomm to address the computing needs of VR all-in-one and ultimately MR product categories, as part of our ongoing strategy to partner with other companies in the industry to bring technology to everyone.
Embark on an epic journey
In addition to the Rift S, we also launched the Quest, the world's first 6DOF VR all-in-one that shipped in 2019. For the first time, people are free to explore the virtual world without the need for cables. Thanks to AI's breakthrough in hand tracking, we're allowing users to explore and interact with the virtual world with their own hands. In October 2020, we launched Quest 2 and welcomed more users onboarded. In 2021, Quest brought a slew of technological developments, such as the original Passthrough and Air Link, two technologies that allowed people to wirelessly stream PCVR games to Quest over WiFi. We continue to roll out new software updates at a steady pace, increasing the value of the headset over time.
In the October 2022 release of Quest Pro, we introduced the world to compelling mixed reality, including eye-tracking and natural facial expressions. Just one year later, in October 2023, the Meta Quest 3 came out as the world's first mass-market MR headset, allowing people around the world to seamlessly blend the virtual and physical worlds.
From multitasking everyday things to courtside seating during the NBA season, from concerts at Meta Horizon Worlds to Hollywood blockbusters in solo theaters, from fully immersive worlds to some of the favorite Xbox games, Quest 3 has established itself as the ultimate home entertainment system. The wide variety of fitness and health apps makes the Quest 3 a great way to reap these benefits. Super Rumble, for example, allows you to eat chicken with your friends through a headset. With the announcement of new partnerships, games, and experiences, the experience is getting better and better.
A new way to connect humans and machines
In 2017, Building 8 made waves with its research into new models of brain-computer interfaces and hands-free communication, but it was a video calling device that really established its legacy.
As Meta's response to smart speakers, Portal provides environmental information, entertainment, and more through screens and AI-powered smart cameras to keep people in the frame during video calls. An award-winning playwright uses Portal to work with actors and directors 3,000 miles away, military families use Portal to stay connected and enjoy storytime while soldiers serve, a Bay Area couple gets engaged through Portal, and a family uses it to spend quality time from coast to coast during the pandemic.
Of course, the path to innovation isn't always linear. Although it eventually went down the buffalo path (extinction), people loved Portal. It gives users a new way to connect across miles and is a lot of fun. From kids sharing their latest handicrafts with families from afar, to never missing a birthday party (or even a Sunday dinner), Portal helps people overcome distance in an important way. This is a leading smart home device...... It was also one of the first products to integrate a screen for video calls.
Smartphones meet smart glasses
Imagine a world where you can take advantage of all the usefulness and benefits of a computer or smartphone in a simplified, more human-centered way. You'll be able to accomplish every thing you want to do and gain more power than ever before. Context-aware AI can help you explore and understand the world around you, and you can get rich 3D virtual information at a glance. You'll also be better able to connect with friends and family, no matter where they are in the world.
Now imagine if you could do it all with a pair of lightweight, stylish glasses, an unprecedented, convenient and easy-to-use device that doesn't force you to choose between the physical and digital worlds, but rather combines the two in a seamless, intuitive way. This pair of glasses allows you to look up at the world and allows you to live in the moment instead of shifting your attention to the edge of your palm.
This is our long-term vision for AR glasses, and we're working in that direction right now. Today's smart glasses are an important stepping stone with a sleek, all-day wearable form factor loaded with smart technology, sensors, and more. That's why we've teamed up with EssilorLuxottica to start with the iconic fashion that people love, and then reimagine what it looks like.
In September 2021, we launched our first-generation smart glasses, Ray-Ban Stories, with impressive open-air audio that's ideal for listening to music, listening to podcasts, and taking calls on the go. But more importantly, Ray-Ban Stories offers people a new way to capture moments while remaining fully immersive, thanks to hands-free capture of high-quality photos and videos.
In October 2023, the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses line debuted, doubling down on the first-generation product. We've integrated Meta AI on our Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses and optimized them for a hands-free mobile experience. By saying "Hey Meta," people can spark creativity, get information, control glasses – just by using sound. Thanks to artificial intelligence, glasses will get better and smarter over time. New AI experiences are coming soon, including multi-modal AI, so glasses can understand what you're seeing and provide helpful answers.
Let's say it's dinner time and you don't know what to eat. You can put some ingredients on the counter and let Meta AI give you recipe suggestions. Or maybe you see a German sign on your travels, you are able to look at the text, and ask Meta AI to translate it for you.
Relentless research
Last but not least, we turn our focus to Reality Labs Research (RL-R). Just like Meta's Fundamental AI Research (FAIR), RL-R was founded because we understand the importance of making big bets on the future. RL-R has a rich heritage of long-tail research dedicated to advancing state-of-the-art technologies in fields ranging from display systems to haptics. We publish our research results on a regular basis to share with the wider research community so that they have the opportunity to expand.
But it's not all moon programs and research prototypes. The RL-R has a number of successful technology deliveries, including Quest hand tracking and audio enhancements in our smart glasses products. It's the RL-R's collaboration with our product team that makes the Pancake lenses and polarization optics in the Quest Pro and Quest 3 a reality.
The team within RL-R (and the product team as a whole) is not resting on its laurels and continues to explore new areas of research that are likely to become industry standards in the coming years, including EMGs, hyper-realistic Codec Avatars, and contextual AI – all of which are exciting new technologies. We believe that with the arrival of the next major paradigm shift in computing, these technologies will help people interact seamlessly with devices.
AI is playing a key role
From computer vision to machine learning and more, AI has always played a key role in our long-term metaverse vision. Recent breakthroughs in the field of large language models (LLMs) are accelerating our progress.
This is where our two big bets as a company come together. The Quest 3 offers engaging MR experiences, from fully immersive to experiences that allow you to interact with the physical world and digital content in synergy, while the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses give you the utility and entertainment of Meta AI, and the AR glasses will achieve the best of both worlds in the convergence of these two technological paths. Just as smartphones didn't make laptops or desktop computers obsolete, AR glasses won't be the end of MR headsets. More precisely, what we see is a series of devices that make up the structure of the future. Thanks to the rapid breakthrough of AI models over the past 18 months, we now believe that the smart glasses we have on the road to all-AR glasses will have a wider appeal and be more useful than we previously thought – even without a display.
Building the future
We're building a new computing platform that will help you better connect with the people and things you care about in a way that's more natural and intuitive than today's 2D screens. This means experiences that can help you work, learn, play, shop, and create in sync with friends and family, as well as new experiences that don't fit easily into the way we use computers and smartphones today.
Technology – especially technology that connects people – should be accessible to as many people as possible. It's the foundation of what we do and it's at the heart of our DNA. Innovation is about achieving new breakthroughs, and to really do that, you need to bring those breakthroughs to the masses.
"The work we're doing can really only be done in a handful of places in the world," Abrash noted. Zuckerberg has invested a great deal of expertise, mission, and resources at Reality Labs to create a once-in-a-50-year opportunity to change the way the world works, games, and connects, just as personal computing does. But more importantly, the next revolution in computing will take place. But how it happens really depends on who's going to execute it, and if you want to be a part of it, then this is the place to be. ”
Over the past decade, we've been honored to work with a group of builders to make the next generation of computing platforms a reality. We are committed to continuing to build in an open manner with partners who are helping to pave the way. We can't wait to see what the next decade holds.