Facebook on March 30 said Palmer Luckey, the 24-year-old co-founder of Oculus VR, is leaving the social media’s virtual reality unit on Friday, March 31.
Oculus is a startup that Facebook acquired in 2014 for about $2billion to grow in virtual reality market. For years, Mr. Luckey served as the face of Oculus; however, he was later sidelined for several months after a series of scandals for financing an internet group, which campaigned against Hillary Clinton ahead of US presidential elections.
As a result, Facebook began distancing itself from Luckey. In a Facebook post on Sept. 23, Luckey apologized for his actions which affected the firm.
In January, Luckey was accused for using a software developed by ZeniMax Media Inc in a lawsuit. A month later, a US jury ruled in ZeniMax’s favour and ordered Facebook to pay a combine $500 million to ZeniMax.
Earlier this year, Facebook hired Xiaomi’s VP Hugo Barra to lead all of its virtual reality efforts, including the Oculus team.
“Palmer will be dearly missed,” Facebook said in a statement to Bloomberg. “Palmer’s legacy extends far beyond Oculus. His inventive spirit helped kickstart the modern VR revolution and helped build an industry. We’re thankful for everything he did for Oculus and VR, and we wish him all the best,” Facebook added.
