India's largest mobile network is in talks with Meta about launching a Horizon OS headset in the country, The Information reports.
The outlet cites "three people with knowledge of the situation" as saying the talks are happening but aren't at the stage where any deal has been finalized.
What Is Meta Horizon OS?
Horizon OS is Meta's new name for the Quest operating system, which it plans to let third-party companies use in future headsets.
So far, ASUS and Lenovo have confirmed their intentions to release Horizon OS headsets.
LG reportedly once planned a Horizon OS headset for 2025, but that deal appears to be heavily delayed or perhaps even canceled.
In addition to its mobile network, Jio also runs an e-commerce platform, digital payments service, and an ecosystem of app-based services including a messaging platform, streaming service, and gaming platform.
Meta took a 10% stake in Jio back in 2020 as part of a deal designed to integrate some of Jio's e-commerce services into WhatsApp. Jio’s controlling shareholder, Mukesh Ambani, is also a personal friend of Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg and his wife attended Ambani's son's wedding earlier this year.
David Heaney
Notably, Jio currently partners with Google for a 4G Android phone it sells for the equivalent of around $50. A Jio VR headset could follow a similar strategy, bringing affordable subsidized hardware running Horizon OS preloaded with Jio services.
Jio has around 1800 physical retail stores in India, which it could potentially use to demo the headset to prospective buyers.
It's unclear exactly how a Jio headset would achieve a significantly lower cost than the upcoming Quest 3S without making major compromises, though. Jio's smartphone does it by using a very low-end chipset, so it's possible the headset could use the original Snapdragon XR2 Gen 1 from Quest 2. Over time this would notably restrict the percentage of Horizon Store content that could run on the headset, and limit its mixed reality capabilities, but these compromises might be seen as necessary to sell well in the Indian market.
We'll be covering any future reports of this potential partnership that could, if it goes through, expand consumer VR to the most populous country on the planet, considered one of the most significant emerging markets.
