Facebook just announced that it has reached a deal to acquire Oculus VR, Inc., for a sum of US$2 billion (~RM6.6 billion). The sale includes US$400 million (~RM1.32 billion) in cash and around US$1.6 billion (~RM5.28 billion) of Facebook common stock, consisting of 23.1 million shares.
Oculus VR is the team behind the Rift, a virtual reality head-mounted display. The company rose to fame after its Kickstarter campaign was overfunded almost nine times over. Our flat TV panel a few feet away usually gives us around 20- to 40-degree viewing angle only, but the idea behind virtual reality is to have the operator view through stereoscopic displays that give a relatively high 110-degree diagonal viewing angle. The approximate field of view of humans is at almost 180 degrees horizontally.
While there are quite a number of obscure VR headsets out there today, they’re usually expensive and reserved for researchers or the military. Oculus Rift aims to get its price low enough for the average gamer to purchase. It is safe to say it is currently the leader in VR technology with more than 75,000 orders of its development kits have been made. Game developers are highly interested in this and have been experimenting with it, but Facebook is planning to bring the technology to new verticals, including education, entertainment, media, and of course, social and communications.
“We are excited to work with Mark and the Facebook team to deliver the very best virtual reality platform in the world,” said co-founder and CEO of Oculus VR, Brendan Iribe. “We believe virtual reality will be heavily defined by social experiences that connect people in magical, new ways. It is a transformative and disruptive technology, that enables the world to experience the impossible, and it’s only just the beginning.”
“Mobile is the platform of today, and now we’re also getting ready for the platforms of tomorrow,” said Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder and CEO. “Oculus has the chance to create the most social platform ever, and change the way we work, play and communicate.”
When the acquisition deal closes, Oculus VR will remain headquartered in Irvine, California, and will continue its research and development. Hopefully with the financial backing of Facebook, we will see the development of the Rift accelerate at a much faster rate to be able to get it mass produced for consumers. The transaction is expected to close in Q2 of 2014.
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