Meta is losing almost $1 billion a month on metaverse dream even as revenue dips

pcgamer.com:

Meta has revealed that it is continuing to haemorrhage money to try and make the metaverse a reality. Meta's Reality Labs division, responsible for its VR and AR ventures, thus an important part of the company's dreams of building a so-called metaverse, lost the company $10B last year, and over the previous six months dropped nearly $6B more.

That's a hole that even an extra $100 from every Quest 2 headset(opens in new tab) sold from here on out isn't going to plug (though there may still be time to get a Quest 2 cheap(opens in new tab)).

You don't have to be a trader by day to know that's a whole lot of cash to be funnelling into a single part of any business. But this is Meta, after all, and its combined operations (including Facebook and Instagram) still net it $46.8B in profit last year, and another $16.9B so far in 2022.

Though Meta is facing more scrutiny following its most recent financial results(opens in new tab). For the previous three-month period the company is down by a whopping single percentage point compared to the same period in 2021. Okay, it's not much, but that's actually the first time ever that Meta (née Facebook) has suffered a loss in revenue year-on-year.

There are a multitude of reasons attributed to Meta's recent slump but its Reality Labs spend is surprisingly not one of the major ones cited. In fact, the VR and AR side of the business losing money is one of the few constants for the business, and the company has generally spoken about these brave new digital realities as one way to actually grow the company in the future.

When the scales tip in favour of profitable VR and AR isn't clear, however. The metaverse feels a long way off yet. The Quest 2(opens in new tab) is a mighty VR machine for