The metaverse, today, is not a business, but a money-burning machine. The company has presented this Wednesday the financial results for the first quarter of 2023 and, once again, the unit destined to make this ambitious project a reality, Reality Labs, has registered an operating loss of 3,992 million dollars.
The reality is that this scenario is not new. Meta’s efforts to develop her virtual world and related technologies to immerse her in it cost her just over $13 billion last year . Now, Mark Zuckerberg has made it clear in a conference with shareholders : “This is a long-term project”
Meta assures that it continues betting on the metaverse
“A narrative has developed that we are somehow moving away from our vision of the metaverse, so I just want to say up front that that’s not accurate,” the social media company’s CEO said. In this sense, he has assured that they remain committed, although they have also been focused on AI.
The executive has assured that the virtual and augmented reality vision in which they are working involves a dedicated operating system. According to them, this advance will become “the basis of the next generation of computing.” Last year we saw Project Cambria evolve into the Meta Quest Pro. This year we could see some new glasses.
Returning to the economic level, although the turnover exceeded the expectations of the analysts and rose 2.6% to 28,645 million dollars , the benefit has also been weighed down by the extraordinary departures resulting from the massive layoffs of the “Year of the Efficiency” . In other words, it has stood at 5,709 million dollars, a 24% drop.
In general terms, however, the company’s balance sheet has not disappointed the market and its shares have risen 10% . Facebook’s daily active users (MAUs) have grown 4% year-on-year and ad impressions across its family of apps (Facebook, Messenger and Instagram) have seen a 26% increase over the same period.
