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[Eddie-Griffin]

https://www.roadtovr.com/pico-gdc-2023-announcement-nothing/

Pico Interactive took to the Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco this week with a massive booth, hyping the event as a “treat” that would be a “Journey to Infinity”. Strangely, there were no substantial announcements from the company there, however a report from The Verge now alleges Pico intentionally delayed its planned announcement of Pico 4’s US rollout due to increased pressure from US lawmakers on sister company TikTok.

Update (March 24th, 2023): The Verge’s senior editor Sean Hollister says in a brief report that a Pico employee told him the planned release of Pico 4 in the US was put on hold due to TikTok weathering a US congressional hearing this week. Both Pico and TikTok are owned by Chinese parent company ByteDance.
We’ve reached out to Pico for comment, and will update if/when we hear back. In the meantime, we’re labeling this a report since the company has yet to go on record. We’ve also included that information in the article below:

Pico, the creator of the Pico 4 standalone, is arguably one of the biggest untapped threats to Meta’s market supremacy in the consumer VR standalone segment. At least for now.

Owned by TikTok parent company ByteDance, many speculated that the China-based Pico was finally ready to announce the consumer launch of Pico 4 in the United States, a step that many (including us) have been waiting for following a US hiring spree last summer.

At the time, a Protocol report maintained the move would usher in “a major focus on content licensing as well as marketing its hardware to U.S. consumers.”

Yes, Pico had a March 22nd "get ready" count down date that resulted in some changes and nothing being announced two days ago.

It seems that due to the hearings regarding TikTok owner Bytedance at the US congress, who also brought and owns Pico, the launch has been delayed for an undisclosed amount of time, which explains the confusion at GDC some attendees had.

This would be a great time for Zucker to announce that Quest 3, or for any other competitors to announce a release date soon. Pico being in the US was always seen as a potential shake-up in the VR market here but it looks like that's been post-ponded.

If companies are smart they would take advantage of this before Pico has a chance to recover and use all that staff and marketing money it's been preparing for the US release the last several months.

 

[Sethbacca]

I'm guessing we won't hear anything about release dates and price points on Quest 3 until Apple blows their load.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

I'm guessing we won't hear anything about release dates and price points on Quest 3 until Apple blows their load.

Zucker is not going to wait until June to announce the Quest 3. He has to keep momentum going he can't let Quest 2's base decline anymore.

 

[Sethbacca]

Zucker is not going to wait until June to announce the Quest 3. He has to keep momentum going he can't let Quest 2's base decline anymore.

I mean, I hope so? I was going to get a PSVR2 but held off (and kind of glad I did honestly), so at this point I'm waiting for Q3 to drop to see what the deal is.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

I mean, I hope so? I was going to get a PSVR2 but held off (and kind of glad I did honestly), so at this point I'm waiting for Q3 to drop to see what the deal is.

He could launch sooner and have no need to worry about competition, meaning that problems can be addressed and he can plan to keep people in his ecosystem until Samsung, TCL, and Apple come out/announce.

He would not do to well to release too late while competing with the other 17 headset releases around the same time. I'm assuming most of the headsets re launching June onward in 2nd half of the year.

 

[reksveks]

I would wait for the apple event to happen before dropping the quest 3 if I was Zuckerberg, you know the price differential story will much more positive in that order.

 

[Eddie-Griffin]

I would wait for the apple event to happen before dropping the quest 3 if I was Zuckerberg, you know the price differential story will much more positive in that order.

Yes, but the he won't have as much momentum, and he could get games out to suck people in ahead of time, letting Quest 2 decline more, only for Apple to come out with a 10x better headset subsidized at Verizon or ATT is game over.

Also Apple isn't the only issue, Pico is still coming out at some point, TCL is coming out, Samsung is coming out, there's a thread of like 15 more headsets coming out this year. Zucker can't wait too long.

 

[Gameplay Gods Bless]

I'm guessing we won't hear anything about release dates and price points on Quest 3 until Apple blows their load.

But Apples headset is $3000, it does not compete with the Quest at all.

 

[mckmas8808]

Zucker is not going to wait until June to announce the Quest 3. He has to keep momentum going he can't let Quest 2's base decline anymore.

100% agree here.

 

[supernova8]

Finally he's gone. So much spam I thought he was part of Monty Python.

 

[chromhound]

Finally he's gone. So much spam I thought he was part of Monty Python.

Alt account i think?

 

[supernova8]

Alt account i think?

Yeah apparently he had two alts or something based on what the mod said in another thread. I actually unignored him just to comment this on one of his threads (dick move I know).

 

[Sethbacca]

But Apples headset is $3000, it does not compete with the Quest at all.

Apple's headset will be the defacto influencer/celebrity headset, that's just the nature of how Apple's releases work. Whether or not Meta is competing against Apple in a market segment, they still have to compete on mindshare. Meta's entire marketing stack from the Quest 3 to the Quest Pro will be against Apple's offering for that.

 

[Beechos]

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