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Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta Platforms Inc., told employees Thursday that WhatsApp and Messenger will drive the company’s next wave of sales growth, as he sought to calm concerns about Meta’s finances after its first mass layoffs.
Zuckerberg, responding to specific questions at a companywide meeting a week after Meta announced it would lay off 11,000 workers, called the two messaging apps “much earlier in monetization” than its advertising giants Facebook and Instagram, according to statements heard. By Reuters.
“We talk a lot about very long-term opportunities like the metaverse, but the reality is that commercial messaging is likely to be the next major pillar of our business as we monetize WhatsApp and Messenger more,” he said.
Meta enables some consumers to talk to and interact with merchants through chat apps, including a new feature announced Thursday in Brazil.
The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment at the internal forum on Thursday.
Zuckerberg’s comments there reflect a shift in tone and focus after focusing heavily on extended reality hardware and software investments since announcing a long-term ambition to build an immersive metaverse last year.
Investors have questioned the wisdom of that decision as underlying advertising firm Meta has suffered this year, halving its share price.
In his remarks to employees, Zuckerberg downplayed how much the company is spending in Reality Labs, the unit responsible for its indirect investments.
People were Meta’s biggest expense, he said, followed by capital expenditures, the vast majority of which went to infrastructure to support its suite of social media apps. About 20% of Meta’s budget was going to Reality Labs.
Zuckerberg said the unit was spending more than half of its budget within Reality Labs on augmented reality (AR), with smart glasses products continuing to appear “over the next few years” and some “really cool” AR glasses later in the decade.
“This is in some ways the most challenging work…but I also think it’s the most valuable part of the extra work,” he said.
About 40% of Reality Labs’ budget is dedicated to virtual reality, while about 10% is spent on futuristic social platforms such as the virtual world called Horizon.
president technology Officer Andrew Bosworth, who runs Reality Labs, said augmented reality glasses should be more useful than mobile phones to attract potential customers and meet a higher standard of attractiveness.
Bosworth said he was wary of developing “industrial applications” for the hardware, describing it as “niche”, and wanted to remain focused on building for a wide audience.
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