I can’t think of any other deal that more encapsulates how Silicon Valley has changed in the past couple of years than this one, announced last week in a press release:
Anduril and Meta are partnering to design, build and field a range of integrated XR products that provide warfighters with enhanced perception and enable intuitive control of autonomous platforms on the battlefield.
For starters, Anduril Industries is a defense tech company co-founded by Palmer Luckey, the man who created the Oculus VR headset that was acquired by Meta Platforms for $2 billion in 2014, only for Luckey to be pushed out when it emerged he had financially backed a pro-Donald Trump campaign group. That he would be welcomed back with open arms is yet another sign that such stances are no longer taboo in the halls of Silicon Valley companies. (It could be argued they never should have been.)
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