Oculus co-founder Brendan Iribe leaves Facebook

MANILA, Philippines – Brendan Iribe, CEO and co-founder of virtual reality (VR) company Oculus, announced his departure with Facebook today.

“So much has happened since the day we founded Oculus in July 2012. I never could have imagined how much we would accomplish and how far we would come. And now, after six incredible years, I am moving on,” Iribe wrote in a Facebook post.

The announcement reportedly came after Facebook, which acquired Oculus in 2014, cancelled the next-generation Rift 2 headset which Iribe had been leading development of.

TechCrunch added Iribe and the Facebook executive team had “fundamentally different views on the future of Oculus that grew deeper over time.”

Iribe wanted to improve performance of their products and focused on PC-powered headsets while Facebook executives wanted all-in-one headsets that don’t require a connection like the Oculus Go.

Facebook, meanwhile, claims PC VR is still part of the company’s future product roadmap.

“While we can’t comment on our product roadmap specifics, we do have future plans, and can confirm that we are planning for a future version of Rift,” a Facebook spokesperson told TechCrunch.

Iribe’s departure comes after a so-called exodus of executives whose startups have been acquired by Facebook.

Last September, Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger announced their exit from the company allegedly due to tensions with Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum similarly left the company because of disagreements with management.