Looking to capitalise on the lucrative potential of the metaverse, big tech giants have ramped up talent poaching efforts.
As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft has had competitors snap up approximately 100 of their experienced HoloLens augmented reality (AR) developers this past year alone.
This is hardly surprising when considering some former Microsoft employees have claimed that offers were sometimes as high as double their salaries.
Per The Wall Street Journal’s findings, the LinkedIn profiles of more than 70 employees on the HoloLens team show they have left Microsoft.
Though notably, more than 40 of those that left Microsoft joined Meta, which has made its alternate-reality ambitions abundantly clear.
Although many of Microsoft’s departed staffers were long-time leaders of the HoloLens team, a spokesperson brushed away concerns saying the company had been at the forefront of metaverse technology for years.
The spokesperson added, we “will keep advancing state of the art hardware that is more immersive, affordable and in various form factors.”
However, no details specifically about the HoloLens team was shared.
It should also be said that Microsoft isn’t the only company to come under siege from Meta’s hunger for growth.
Apple is said to have also lost employees to Meta, according to former Microsoft workers who have moved to Meta.
Meta declined to comment to The Journal about its recruiting practices however, they’ve been very transparent about their plan to bolster acquisitions as they reposition around the metaverse.
Currently, most tech titans are aggressively advancing their AR capabilities, but Microsoft has the advantage of being the first to the table.
Because Microsoft was one of the first movers in the AR space with HoloLens, Jitesh Ubrani, research manager, IDC, believes that “Microsoft still has quite a bit of a head start in the AR space.”
For this reason, some analysts believe this makes Microsoft employees a particularly attractive target for headhunting.
