Why did Meta show Orion now?

Executive summary

Welcome to your weekly briefing on the metaverse and spatial computing. Here are your snippets to sound smarter in meetings this week:

• Top story: Meta showed off its prototype Orion AR glasses (analysis below)

• China Quarterly: China’s ‘big-space VR’ boom, and its rising star in XR glasses.

• Other stories: A UNESCO World Heritage Site has been recreated in Fortnite for a new campaign by Diyirah, and Readyverse Studios and Wētā Workshop unveiled the first visuals for OPEN, the first AAA immersive battle royale game (more below).

Top story

Meta showed off its Orion spectacles, betting that it will be the next computing platform.

• Enough has been said about its capabilities. Orion can read the world, has neural-type interactions, and can place AR-related objects over the world. The capabilities are there, but the cost is too high for a wider audience.

• A more interesting discussion is why Meta even showed it. Why did the company unveil a prototype years before its official release, and as a final announcement at its annual conference? Imagine if Tim Cook announced a prototype, showed off what it could do, and say that it’ll come in two years. It might expose Meta if any changes to the plan come up.

• In my personal view, there may be two reasons. One is to profile its work to bring more people into its Reality Labs division, which requires such a specific job type that finding the right person can be hard. And the other is share price; by showing its roadmap to lead on the next computing platform, Meta hopes to get more interest and value so that it can manifest its vision.

Other stories

• BlueSprig Pediatrics announced in new research that VR can help children with ASD acquire and practice social, communication and safety skills.

• Distance Technologies announced it had closed a seed round of funding of €10mn.

• Qualcomm announced that the Meta Quest 3S uses the Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 platform.

• Readyverse Studios and Wētā Workshop unveiled the first visuals for OPEN, the first AAA immersive, battle royale game.

• Resolution Games announced that its newest title, Home Sports, will come to the Meta Quest 3 family.

• SURGAR, an AR surgery company, raised $11mn in funding.

• TREBUCHET announced today that Prison Boss: Prohibition will launch in spring 2025.

• A UNESCO World Heritage Site has been recreated in Fortnite for a new campaign by Diyirah.

Note: The Immersive Wire is run by Tom Ffiske, who also works within Accenture’s metaverse group. The contents of the newsletter should not be regarded as Accenture’s views.