Reuters was first to share that Tencent Holdings (0700.HK) is abandoning plans to venture into virtual reality hardware, as a sobering economic outlook prompts the Chinese tech giant to cut costs and headcount at its metaverse unit, three sources familiar with the matter said. The world’s largest video game publisher had ambitious plans to build both virtual reality software and hardware at an “extended reality” XR unit it launched in June of 2022. Tencent shares slipped as much as 2.5% after Reuters’ report.