Meta is planning to lay off employees tomorrow in the unit of its metaverse-oriented Reality Labs division focused on creating custom silicon, two sources familiar with the matter said.
Employees were informed of the layoffs in a post on Meta's internal discussion forum Workplace today.
The post said they would be notified about their status with the company by early tomorrow morning, one of the sources said.
It is understood that Meta's operations in Ireland are not currently affected by this round of layoffs.
In May, the company announced that around 490 Irish-based jobs would be cut.
Around 320 jobs were lost at Meta's Irish operation in November and the company currently employs around 2,500 people here.
A Meta spokesperson declined to comment on the plans.
Reuters was not able to determine the extent of the cuts to the silicon unit, called Facebook Agile Silicon Team, or FAST, which has roughly 600 employees, according to the other source.
The FAST unit is tasked with developing custom chips to power the augmented and virtual reality hardware produced by Meta's Reality Labs division.
Meta currently makes a line of mixed reality headsets called Quest and smart glasses designed with Ray-Ban eyeglass maker EssilorLuxottica (ESLX.PA) that can stream video and speak with wearers through a new artificial intelligence virtual assistant.
It announced new versions of the smart glasses and its consumer-oriented Quest headset, Quest 3, at its annual Connect conference last week.
The company is also working on augmented reality glasses capable of projecting virtual objects onto see-through lenses, along with associated smart watches, according to one of the sources.
However, Meta has struggled to make chips that can compete with silicon produced by external providers and has turned to chipmaker Qualcomm (QCOM.O) for devices currently on the market, including both the Quest headsets and the Ray-Ban glasses.
