Software giant Microsoft is shutting down one of its most important groups dedicated to developing and promoting the industrial metaverse. The company reportedly laid off its entire Industrial Metaverse Core group, which consisted of 100 employees, as part of rounds of layoffs of 10,000 people announced in January.
Microsoft will reportedly terminate Industrial Metaverse Group
Microsoft, the Washington-based software giant, appears to be ditching the metaverse in favor of other initiatives. According reports from The Information, the company internally announced the dissolution of the Industrial Metaverse Core group, a division of the company aimed at bringing the metaverse to industrial settings.
The group, which was formed just 4 months ago, served as a bridge for the implementation of metaverse interfaces to control electric power plants, industrial robotics, and transportation networks. The split was part of efforts to bring the metaverse to industrial settings by connecting software to this initiative.
The 100 employees who were part of the group were fired. However, Microsoft has said that products created by the group will continue to be supported in the future. The company fixed:
We are applying our focus to the areas of the industry metaverse that matter most to our customers and will see no change in the way they are supported. We look forward to sharing additional information in the future.
Microsoft had previously announced a round of 10,000 layoffs as part of a restructuring process in January.
Out the metaverse, in the AI
The recent turn of events suggests that Microsoft is taking some of its resources from metaverse initiatives to put them into other areas like artificial intelligence (AI). Previous reports indicate that other metaverse projects have been affected by Microsoft’s cutbacks, with employees at metaverse platform Altspacevr, which announced its closure in March, and Mixed Reality Tool Kit, also laid off.
Microsoft has been putting funds behind AI-based startups since January. On January 23, the company revealed a “multi-million dollar, multi-year investment” in Openai, the company behind the development of GPT-3 and its Chatgpt interface. Additionally, as part of this partnership, Microsoft recently Announced the inclusion of Chatgpt in Bing, its search engine, and also as part of Edge, its web browser.
To accompany this move, Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, stated:
AI will fundamentally change all categories of software, starting with the biggest category of all: search.
What do you think about ending metaverse-focused groups at Microsoft? Tell us in the comments section below.
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