ByteDance, the Chinese tech giant behind TikTok, and Qualcomm are collaborating on XR hardware and software. ByteDance acquired Pico last year, a Chinese startup which launched the first standalone VR headset a year before Oculus Go.
Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon said of the ByteDance partnership:
“We’re collaborating on hardware/software to enable a global XR ecosystem and developing an XR device roadmap using the Snapdragon XR platform”.
With Snapdragon Spaces Qualcomm offers these core technologies to device makers entering the AR/VR space, letting them focus on the hardware and content. Snapdragon Spaces offer positional tracking, hand tracking, and spatial anchors.
This partnership could allow ByteDance to keep up with Meta, at least in the short term, by leveraging Qualcomm’s existing technology. But it’s unclear yet whether ByteDance actually intends to compete in the western consumer market, or instead stay focused on China.
ByteDance CEO Liang Rubo said:
“We are excited about the fact that we will be working together on hardware, software, and technology roadmaps to enable the ecosystem for Pico. We look forward to our future Pico devices that are powered by the Snapdragon Spaces XR developer platform.”
