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Hugo Barra to head Oculus as Facebook's virtual reality VP

By Daniel Petrov

Updated: Jan 26, 2017, 4:26 AM

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Google's former Android darling, Hugo Barra, finally dispelled the lingering doubts over what exactly is he going to do, now that he is back in Silicon Valley from his position as VP of the Chinese up-and-comer Xiaomi. What, a VR position, of course, did you expect anything else? That's also not any VR job, but a head of Facebook's virtual reality efforts. Given that Facebook now owns Oculus, there will be no shortage of talent in the department that Hugo Barra will be heading. As you can see in the interview above, he has some pretty strong opinions on how virtual reality contraptions should behave going forward.

There is a veritable war brewing among the Silicon Valley juggernauts in the field of augmented and virtual reality, which both Google and Apple chiefs are on record pegging as the next frontier to fight over. So, instead of trying to push Xiaomi's value-for-money handsets in the Indian market, with a slim chance to ever introduce them to Western users, Hugo Barra decided to try his luck at the next big thing that Silicon Valley is going to push down to our unsuspecting heads.

Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the move in a post saying: "Hugo shares my belief that virtual and augmented reality will be the next major computing platform. They’ll enable us to experience completely new things and be more creative than ever before." Mark Zuckerberg was recently on record during a patent infringement testimony against Oculus, saying that he expects it will take 15 years to get virtual reality where it should be, so the timeline that Hugo Barra will be working with spans quite a period to experiment with and come up with truly usable VR concepts that won't need a bulky gizmo strapped to your head.

source: WSJ

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Daniel, a devoted tech writer at PhoneArena since 2010, has been engrossed in mobile technology since the Windows Mobile era. His expertise spans mobile hardware, software, and carrier networks, and he's keenly interested in the future of digital health, car connectivity, and 5G. Beyond his professional pursuits, Daniel finds balance in travel, reading, and exploring new tech innovations, while contemplating the ethical and privacy implications of our digital future.