Meta has burned $15 billion trying to build the metaverse

[hatshepsut93]

Meta has burned $15 billion trying to build the metaverse — and nobody's saying exactly where the money went

Meta has spent more than $15 billion on its Reality Labs metaverse venture since the beginning of last year, but so far, the company hasn't shared on what, precisely, money is being spent.

Some experts are getting worried the company is spending good money after bad.

"The problem is that they spend the money, but the transparency with investors has been a disaster," Dan Ives, a tech analyst at Wedbush Securities, said.

"This continues to be a risky bet by Zuckerberg and the team because, for now, they're betting money on the future while they continue to have massive headwinds on their core business," he added.

I always thought that Metaverse is a stupid idea, it can only succeed when VR is massively popular, which it is not right now. Zuck is trying to put a cart before the horse.

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[Husires]

If Facebook, with all this budget and materials, has not yet been able to build a good metaverse model, then what about these coins that are trying to scam investors with 100k ICO, Bounty, .....
this industry and Web V3 is for multi billion companies more than something small businesses can build.

[noorman0]

I don't know how long I haven't heard of the progress of their project which I think has stalled in the last few months. If I look at crypto-based metaverse projects that seem to be fading, I don't see any hope that Meta will achieve the same success and fate as Libra in the past.
On the other hand, Facebook is the only platform that is becoming increasingly unclear on its orientation.

[Doan9269]

The Metaverse at large isn't a failed project and those that has key into this are also working tiredlessly to bring out something unique from it but i must confess that it is not what is as simple as we all taught, i think we are only on the ideological stage and more resea needs to bebdone in other to bring this ideas into practical reality, which will obviously take time, money and efforts, the Facebook Meta are also trying on their own but it's not what we should expect to into live like this soon, but time will definitely bring to unfold what it has through Metaverse and those that set in first will make a lifetime history with it, let's keep the fingers crossed and see who comes in first.

[Sithara007]

No sympathies for Zuckerberg. He is the same idiot who tried to steal the idea of cryptocurrency and tried to build his own version (Diem/Libra). He spent quite a lot of money on it, and even sent David Marcus to a senate hearing to defend this coin. Metaverse is yet another shitty idea, which will bring Zuckerberg close to bankruptcy. I guess he is feeling insecure due to the decreasing popularity of Facebook. But it is natural. Facebook achieved growth at the expense of MySpace and Orkut 10-15 years ago. Now time has come for Facebook to undergo the same treatment.

[Fortify]

Meta has burned $15 billion trying to build the metaverse — and nobody's saying exactly where the money went

Meta has spent more than $15 billion on its Reality Labs metaverse venture since the beginning of last year, but so far, the company hasn't shared on what, precisely, money is being spent.

Some experts are getting worried the company is spending good money after bad.

"The problem is that they spend the money, but the transparency with investors has been a disaster," Dan Ives, a tech analyst at Wedbush Securities, said.

"This continues to be a risky bet by Zuckerberg and the team because, for now, they're betting money on the future while they continue to have massive headwinds on their core business," he added.

I always thought that Metaverse is a stupid idea, it can only succeed when VR is massively popular, which it is not right now. Zuck is trying to put a cart before the horse.

You've got to wonder where such a big sum of money really ends up and how the breakdown actually looks. Whether it is mostly spent on arranging server contracts, hiring super computers to do some sort of modelling, building up data centers, or how much staffing is allocated to this project. It makes a super convenient way to offset taxes by reallocating budgets or hiding certain costs within this research & development which might actually benefit other companies within the Meta group. The more they spend on this project, the more they can write off profits in places like Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp - I hope the regulators are paying close attention to the accounts.

[jackg]

I think Facebook's metaverse spending spree is probably more of an existential issue than one that'll be fixed soon, they might even find more things to attempt to invent in the meantime while making themselves even less efficient.

They seemed to have problems going down the route most other big tech firms did by selling cloud computing (I think this was particularly because of how slow Facebook's servers have always been). The metaverse might go like those games available on Facebook too (messenger particularly). Google then got instant playable games that didn't ping all your friends who played the same game with your score whenever you played it...

I don't know how long I haven't heard of the progress of their project which I think has stalled in the last few months. If I look at crypto-based metaverse projects that seem to be fading, I don't see any hope that Meta will achieve the same success and fate as Libra in the past.
On the other hand, Facebook is the only platform that is becoming increasingly unclear on its orientation.

Most games can now have tiny teams and fairly small budgets. I've played some good games that have a core team of about 80 devs.

For the biggest mmo rpgs I can think of:
Final fantasy 14 has 400 devs
World of warcraft is estimated to be 100-300 people

I think these VR experience builds will become cheaper the more they're built though too. Most of what's needed for AR and VR is already out there - I bought a game on steam back in 2017 and was given a VR version of the game (I didn't play it that way though because I don't think it'd have been that much different).
There will likely be the first few attempts at the metaverse before it comes a lot cheaper to produce though (unless someone like unity tries to take it on straight away). Films also became more expensive to produce somehow even though a lot of their editing and production costs became cheaper (mainly because of the cameras they need iirc) this could be something that happens with the metaverse too. 

[cabron]

Just making it appear like they are building something. Well they have something they call  Reality Labs that is something to spend on.
VR devices is really expensive and according to the article which I consider a clue to what they are doing, they are building something maybe a VR device that will not make us look like an alien when we put it on our heads.

But maybe Zuck really knows what he is doing after all he bought Instagram that turned out to be the best investment too.

[Jemzx00]

If Facebook, with all this budget and materials, has not yet been able to build a good metaverse model, then what about these coins that are trying to scam investors with 100k ICO, Bounty, .....
this industry and Web V3 is for multi billion companies more than something small businesses can build.

Completely disagree with you comparing facebook to other tokens that started thru ICO or IPO. Facebook's company may have one of the largest company to start something on the crypto industry however it doesn't guarantee that they could succeed to anything they plan to.
Each and every startup crypto has different usecase which is why some of them failed and some of them end up a success. You don't need to have a multi billion company for your project to succeed but rather be able to follow through your plans and roadmap.

[spectre71]

Growing up in and participating in Silicon Valley tech long before the internet, this is how it goes. Small team of very bright people get together and make a dream happen. It's exciting and knew. then the company get's too big too fast and is no longer agile and innovative. It's struggles to force innovation and buckles under it's own weight.

Zuck has bloated woke pig that won't sing anymore. I think VR/Meta is a something looking for an application.

I think it's dumb as NFT's.

[DudeAtWork420]

Meta has burned $15 billion trying to build the metaverse — and nobody's saying exactly where the money went

Meta has spent more than $15 billion on its Reality Labs metaverse venture since the beginning of last year, but so far, the company hasn't shared on what, precisely, money is being spent.

Some experts are getting worried the company is spending good money after bad.

"The problem is that they spend the money, but the transparency with investors has been a disaster," Dan Ives, a tech analyst at Wedbush Securities, said.

"This continues to be a risky bet by Zuckerberg and the team because, for now, they're betting money on the future while they continue to have massive headwinds on their core business," he added.

I always thought that Metaverse is a stupid idea, it can only succeed when VR is massively popular, which it is not right now. Zuck is trying to put a cart before the horse.

Its obvious that he made a gamble to jump into this technology so early. But this could be a massive gain as well. When other companies will be thinking about metaverse his company will already have tons of experience and staffed developed. So when the adoption will begin they will be ahead of everyone else in the field that time. Only time can tell he was right or wrong.

[DrBeer]

Another example of a project that came to the market before it became really in demand. An attempt to become a "pioneer" turned out to be somewhat unsuccessful.
But a negative experience is actually the MOST VALUABLE. It will be used by the players of this market, it will be used by Meta itself, and it will definitely be used by those who build a similar business, most likely taking a pause in order to more accurately assess the market and the prospects for such solutions. I will say one thing - this failure will save many even more money, and the Meta and Zuckerberg will receive the most valuable, albeit insanely expensive, experience.

[goaldigger]

That’s a lot of money for a project that didn’t exist yet, META is really cooking something here and they are preparing for something big. We might see them failed but I think they are serious about this Metaverse and they will not lose that much if this is not worth it. Transparency might be the only problem here, but as an investors let’s just hope that they are doing good behind the scene because for sure, when that project goes live many will adopt.

[AmoreJaz]

That’s a lot of money for a project that didn’t exist yet, META is really cooking something here and they are preparing for something big. We might see them failed but I think they are serious about this Metaverse and they will not lose that much if this is not worth it. Transparency might be the only problem here, but as an investors let’s just hope that they are doing good behind the scene because for sure, when that project goes live many will adopt.

though we can't say for sure about the future of what they are cooking right now, but they are maybe doing something behind the curtains because that amount is not small and for sure, they need to get it from somewhere. i don't think they will just let it go and call it a day of losses. we may be surprised in the near future what they will be offering here to their users. remember, as of now, they have 2.9B+ active users. that's a lot of market to explore with. so that $15B would be easy for them to get back once they launched whatever they are cooking here.

[Johnyz]

Investors have the right to know this and usually companies needs to disclose this to the authority and I’m sure they are not doing any illegal here, maybe it’s a pure preparation for the big events ahead. META changed their name for nothing, they are doing something that can blow our minds in the future, we should already anticipate this and hope that they are doing this for the benefits of many. Metaverse is still here, it may take more time but let’s hope that it’s worth it.

[livingfree]

I have read and somewhat followed that progress. But it seems that even they've got a huge budget for the project, they're quite late on it during the hype.

Everything has been down and it's not a good time to launch it. There's something wrong to those people behind working with their Metaverse project but that's not probably a thing to them because they're looking at it as a long term project and feature.

We can have that thought that changing the name of their company has a huge part of it and just telling everyone that they're ready. But, the timing isn't that perfect at all.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I always thought that Metaverse is a stupid idea, it can only succeed when VR is massively popular, which it is not right now. Zuck is trying to put a cart before the horse.

From what little I've seen on Youtube (mostly that video of Zuck's lifeless avatar giving the grand tour of the Metaverse) it does indeed seem stupid, even for hardcore tech-heads, gamers, and/or whoever else might be interested in VR innovation. 

I know it's been a long time since Zuckerberg "created" Facebook, but maybe he's let things go to his head and thinks he can create demand for something like that.  But whatever the case may be, it sounds like Meta investors aren't happy with the black hole those billions of dollars are going into.  I mean Jesus, that's a lot of money for any company to be spending on R&D, and if it's not clear to shareholders exactly what the money is being spent on....there's a big investor-relations problem there.

Let that company and all its projects die, and the quicker the better.  Facebook/Meta is just one Big Brother out of several that needs to be blown out of the water.

[samcrypto]

I have read and somewhat followed that progress. But it seems that even they've got a huge budget for the project, they're quite late on it during the hype.

Everything has been down and it's not a good time to launch it. There's something wrong to those people behind working with their Metaverse project but that's not probably a thing to them because they're looking at it as a long term project and feature.

With that kind of funds, they can easily create hype and beside, they didn't launch any yet and maybe they also understand that the market situation right now it not a good timing to introduce such project.

That Billions of funds will not be put in waste, I'm sure META is prepared for this and they already anticipate the government intervention once they launch this project. Maybe they still need more time before they disclose any information with regards to this one.

[STT]

Its easy to spend that much money when considering the price of the hardware concerned, to create that VR area is quite a large taskload.   Add in software and development costs and I guess 15bn is only the beginning.    I think like most great advancements it will come from the bottom not via large spending, they might do better to start simple and back in the day that meant wireframe type graphics not the full featured ultra realism we are used to.
  When establishing a concept they need to start with the basics even a large company like this, I'd like to think an indie developer stumbles across the best avenue to advancement that really keys with peoples perceptions.

[VanillaH]

I'm very doubtful about the "metaverse", but who knows, maybe I'm wrong!