Apple goggles threatens, affirms Mark Zuckerberg, metaverse

Apple chief executive Tim Cook delivers remarks at a privacy event in Washington in April 2022.

When Apple CEO Tim Cook unveiled Vision Pro this week, he described the tech giant's high-tech headset as a revolutionary device that "augments reality by seamlessly blending the real world with the digital world."

It echoed a pitch from Mark Zuckerberg two years ago, when he announced Facebook's new name, Meta, and raved about the metaverse "where you’re in the experience, not just looking at it."

Cook described Vision Pro, which will set consumers back a whopping $3,500, as Apple's bold expansion to "spatial computing." He didn't mention the metaverse, but Apple's new product quickly sparked speculation that suddenly Team Zuckerberg faces a tough and serious rival in the new arena he hoped to conquer.

IDC President Crawford Del Prete said that with the introduction of Vision Pro, Apple was re-framing the augmented reality category.

"Is it a threat to Meta? Of course," he told The Examiner. "It will take a while for this story to unfold. In my opinion, what Apple debuted is an initial volley to demonstrate ‘the possible.’ Apple will iterate, cost reduce and improve the design and form factor over time. This is just the beginning."

"The battle is on," entrepreneur Tiago Amaral told The Examiner, noting that Meta may soon face off with a company known for "building some of the best hardware for decades."

While Meta has been "investing billions of dollars per year" on its metaverse technologies, he said, Apple also has a solid track record in building "powerful ecosystems around their products, something that is still missing in the VR/AR industry."

Rebecca Wetteman, CEO and principal analyst at Valoir, pointed to Apple's "consumer appeal and ability to deliver well-designed products" which give the company key advantages in the virtual reality market.

Apple's Vision Pro news "isn't a nail in the coffin for Meta, but it's close," she told the Examiner.

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On the flip side, some see Apple entering the spatial computing realm might actually be great news for the metaverse and Meta.

Amaral said Vision Pro could actually "benefit Meta, by bringing more people into this market in the long term and growing market size."

Unanimous AI CEO Louis Rosenberg agreed, saying he doesn't see Apple as a threat to Meta or other players in the space.

"If anything, all major companies working on immersive technologies will benefit from Apple's legitimizing impact on the field," he told The Examiner.

Having Apple join the VR party could also be a plus when the technology inevitably raises questions about security and privacy, he added.

"Regulators and policymakers need to pay close attention to this space because immersive devices have such deep potential to track users, monitor their emotions, and potentially influence them," Rosenberg said. "Apple's presence should help push things in the right direction."

Even Zuckerberg has acknowledged that building the metaverse is a major undertaking that will require the efforts of "creators and developers making new experiences and digital items that are interoperable and unlock a massively larger creative economy."

"The metaverse will not be created by one company," he said.

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Benjamin Pimentel is The Examiner's senior technology reporter.