Meta’s heated rivalry with Apple enters new phase as the tech giants go after headsets

$Meta Platforms(META.US)$ $Apple(AAPL.US)$ With Apple officially announcing its long-awaited mixed-reality headset — the Vision Pro — on Monday, the iPhone maker and Facebook’s parent are now firmly in the same market.
Zuckerberg and Cook both see the next major era of personal computing as one that involves people putting on a headset to enter a virtual world and interacting with digital objects in 3D. Cook describes it as spatial computing, and Zuckerberg calls it the metaverse. Other technologists refer to it as mixed or augmented reality, because digital imagery can be superimposed on to the physical world.
Facebook jumped into the market nine years ago, when it acquired VR headset startup Oculus for $2 billion. In late 2021, the company changed its name to Meta, and Zuckerberg committed to spending billions of dollars a quarter developing the underlying VR and AR technologies needed to make his vision of the future a reality.
As of today, Meta owns the lion’s share of a nascent market, far outpacing rivals like $Sony(SONY.US)$ , $PTC Inc(PTC.US)$ and $Magic Software Enterprises(MGIC.US)$ in headset sales.

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