Gandeng Tencent Holdings, Meta Bakal Gebrak Pasar China With Headset VR

Meta is once again trying to hit the Chinese market, this time through a Virtual Reality (VR) hardware partnership with Tencent Holdings. (photo: dock. meta)

JAKARTA - Meta is once again trying to hit the Chinese market, this time through a Virtual Reality (VR) hardware partnership with Tencent Holdings.

According to a technology news outlet report, China 36Kr, talks between Tencent and Meta began last year and have continued in recent months.

The China giant Extended Reality (XR) team will work closely with Meta to bring the VR Quest 2 headset to consumers on an undetermined date.

The headset has been in the works over the past four months, and will follow Tencent's partnership arrangements with Japan-based video game company Nintendo Co to distribute the local version of the Switch console in mainland China.

Tencent, which is also the world's largest video game publisher, has ambitious plans to build the two VRs on an expanded reality XR unit, launched in June last year amid growing global interest in the virtual world metaverse concept.

But Reuters reported last week that they had decided to stop developing XR's own hardware due to profitability issues, and told most employees in the unit to look for opportunities elsewhere.

At the time, Tencent was making adjustments to several business teams as hardware development plans had changed

One of its main rivals in China's virtual reality space is TikTok owner ByteDance which owns headset manufacturer Pico.

Furthermore, the distribution agreement with Tencent will allow Meta to make a breakthrough into the Chinese consumer market, which Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has long hoped for.

Zuckerberg continues to make himself loved by China including hosting the country's internet tsar Lu Wei on the Facebook campus in 2014, as quoted by SCMP.

Despite these efforts, Facebook remains blocked in China along with other Western internet services such as Google and YouTube search engines, despite continuing to run the advertising business in the Bamboo Curtain Country.