Oculus VR has acquired the company behind the Xbox 360 controller

I am quite sure that many of us have heard of Oculus VR before, which so happens to be the company behind the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, not to mention that Oculus VR is in the process of being acquired by the folks over at Facebook for a cool $2 billion. Oculus VR has big plans for the future, where among them include building an MMO with a target of 1 billion players running all over the place. Having said that, Oculus VR is on an acquisition spree themselves, having picked up the Carbon Design team in order to expand their product engineering group. The Carbon Design Team right now has already picked up more than 50 awards, and happens to be a top team when it comes to industrial design and product engineering. Their past accolades and achievements include the likes of Microsoft hardware design, ranging from the Xbox 360 controller to the Xbox 360 wheel, Touch, Arc Touch, Express, Mobile and Wireless mice, LifeCam and of course, the Kinect motion tracking system as one of their more recent “exploits”.

Oculus VR, Facebook’s virtual reality gaming headset company, has announced that it has acquired Carbon Design. Based in Seattle, Washington, Carbon Design is known for its exquisite consumer electronics designs and product engineering. The Carbon Design team will operate from its studio in Seattle and work closely with the Oculus R&D team in Redmond, Washington following the acquisition. The deal is expected to close in the summer. Carbon designed numerous devices like the Xbox 360 controller, a racing wheel controller and the original Microsoft Kinect. Oculus VR and Carbon Design have been collaborating for more than a year on multiple unannounced projects. Peter Bristol, the creative director of Carbon, is excited to join Oculus because he believes that virtual reality is open to innovation. “This is an entirely open product category,” said Bristol in a blog post. “With consumer VR at its inception, the physical architectures are still unknown — We’re on the cutting edge of defining how virtual reality looks, feels, and functions. We’re incredibly excited to be part of the team and we’re looking forward to helping design the future.” Facebook acquired Oculus VR for $2 billion in March. In the acquisition announcement, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that Oculus will become a platform for many other experiences aside from gaming. “Imagine enjoying a court side seat at a game, studying in a classroom of students and teachers all over the world or consulting with a doctor face-to-face — just by putting on goggles in your home,” said Zuckerberg in a Facebook status about the acquisition.