It seems that now Facebook is entering into the console world as well. The company has acquired Oculus VR, the company which is building the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, for a whopping $2 billion. The company (Oculus) has kept one condition that it will keep its headquarters in Irvine, California only and not shift its base.
“We are very excited to work with Zuckerberg and the Facebook team to deliver the best virtual reality platform in the world,” Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe said in a press release. “We also believe that VR will be majorly defined by social experiences that connect people in magical, new ways. It is a modern and transformative technology, that enables the world to experience the impossible, and it’s only just the start.”
Mark Zuckerberg was elated by the acquisition. He said that he views the Oculus Rift as a new way of communication. He wrote following about the same in a Facebook post:
“The Oculus Rift is highly anticipated by the gaming community, and there’s also a lot of interest from developers in building for this platform. We’re going to focus on helping Oculus to build this product and develop partnerships to support more and more games. Oculus will continue operating independently within Facebook to achieve this. But this is just the start and after games, we’re going to make Oculus a platform for many other experiences as well. Like, imagine enjoying a court side seat at a game, studying in a classroom of students and teachers all over the world or consulting with a doctor face-to-face – just by putting on goggles sitting in your home.”
Pre-orders for the Oculus Rift dev. kit 2.0 began last week, after Oculus VR shipped more than 60,000 units of the original model.