A current report from The Data maintains Meta has began outsourcing some design for upcoming headsets amid a shift to maneuver a part of its manufacturing out of China. Now, Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth refutes these particular design claims, saying headsets will proceed to be designed “in home.”
In line with The Data (non-paywalled by way of SeekingAlpha) Meta is reportedly planning to maneuver half of its Quest headset manufacturing from China to Vietnam, a step carried out to keep away from upcoming steep import tariffs quickly to be levied on that nation by US President-elect Donald Trump.
The report moreover alleges Meta is ready to shift extra of its part design, together with lenses and shows, to Goertek, the Chinese language unique design manufacture (ODM) identified for creating each reference designs and manufacturing units for firms throughout the XR business.
Moreover, Meta has reportedly tapped Goertek and different producers to ultimately develop its headsets by 2030, as the corporate is claimed to transition to focus extra on its profitable software program enterprise. Such a joint design manufacturing relationship would allegedly embody Meta outlining objectives to Goertek, which then proposes a number of choices for Meta to select from.
Andrew Bosworth, Meta CTO and head of the corporate’s XR-focused Actuality Labs, has nonetheless refuted these particular design claims in a current X put up.
“[S]omeone is pushing the design rumor arduous to a number of retailers, and that side stays false,” Bosworth says. “We proceed to design our headsets in home as we’ve and don’t have any plans to vary that. We all the time accomplice with our producers to some extent however nothing materials is altering there.”
In a follow-up put up, Bosworth underlines its work with Goertek will probably be enterprise as standard.
“To be clear, Goertek is a superb accomplice and as elements of our stack are extra mature and used from headset to headset we’re glad to have them carry the designs throughout which has all the time been true. However this isn’t a change from how we’ve carried out enterprise with them whilst we scale it up.”
Citing a Meta worker, The Data moreover studies Goertek has begun designing the outer shell for future variations of Meta’s MR headsets, and is now taking part in a bigger position in R&D for different Meta merchandise, together with its Ray-Ban Meta good glasses.
Earlier this 12 months Goertek injected $280 million into its Vietnamese subsidiary, which based on the Shenzhen Inventory Trade submitting is claimed to specialise in manufacturing client electronics merchandise, comparable to headphones, smartwatches, and VR and AR units.
