Just days after acquiring the team behind Pulse, an automated updater for Slack, Mozilla has now acquired Active Replica, a Vancouver-based startup that’s focused on building VR-forward virtual event and collaboration technologies.
Mozilla’s SVP Imo Udom said in a blog post, “Together, we see this as a key opportunity to bring even more innovation and creativity to Hubs than we could alone. We will benefit from their unique experience and ability to create amazing experiences that help organizations use virtual spaces to drive impact. They will benefit from our scale, our talent, and our ability to help bring their innovations to the market faster.”
Before the acquisition, Active Replica hadn’t publicly announced outside funding. Its founders Jacob Ervin and Valerian Denis assumed new roles at Mozilla within the past few weeks as senior engineering manager and product lead, respectively.
Ervin and Denis said in a statement, “Mozilla has long advocated for a healthier internet and has been an inspiration to us in its dedication and contributions to the open web. By joining forces with the Mozilla Hubs team, we’re able to further expand on our mission and inspire a new generation of creators, connectors, and builders. Active Replica will continue to work with our existing customers, partners, and community.”
Mozilla has so far gotten mixed results ever since it stepped into the metaverse. Although the Hubs platform is doing well and is already looking to improve with the acquisition of Active Replica, Mozilla did shut down its four-year-old Firefox Reality browser in February 2022 and urged users to use igalia’s Wolvic, a different open-sourced browser.
Isa Muhammad is a writer and video game journalist covering many aspects of entertainment media including the film industry. He's steadily writing his way to the sharp end of journalism and enjoys staying informed. If he's not reading, playing video games or catching up on his favourite TV series, then he's probably writing about them.
