The VR Winter

Why organizational readiness matters more than the next headset.

The first time I heard someone say "the VR winter is here," my first thought was: here we go again. Eye roll included.

The debate about VR has always been a polarizing one. The technology gets dismissed as a gimmick. Not needed. A solution looking for a problem. And every time VR picks up momentum, the same crowd shows up to explain why it won't work. Every. Single. Time.

Here's the thing though. The problem with VR, and certainly with Meta's push, was that it was too quick and too soon. But someone needs to push for something new. Remember the iPhone launch? Was anyone sitting around waiting for a phone with a big screen? The internet. No one said "I need a network where I can access information or I'll die tomorrow." And yet, time and time again, this is the impossible standard that VR is held to. Prove you're indispensable before anyone has even tried you.

After 15+ years in this space, I've seen enough cycles to recognize the patterns. And more importantly, I've seen the mistakes. Here's what keeps going wrong.

AR vs. VR is the wrong debate

This keeps coming up in strategy meetings. AR is the future, VR is yesterday. The reality is more nuanced than that.

AR solves a different use case. It will be adopted quicker in day to day workflows. Combined with AI, it gets supercharged. No argument there. But it doesn't eliminate the need for VR. It depends entirely on what you're trying to achieve.

This is also why Android XR will offer different devices over time. Samsung and Google understand there is no one size fits all. The smart play for any organization is to think in terms of a spectrum of immersive tools, each matched to specific business outcomes. Not one device to rule them all.

The integration gap

When VR is bolted on as a standalone experience disconnected from existing workflows, it creates friction. And friction kills adoption. Every time.

Here's the example I keep coming back to. Do you need to run all your meetings in VR? No. But you should be able to start a call in Zoom, switch to VR when the conversation moves into technicalities that are easier shown in a 3D context, and when you take off the headset you continue in Zoom. Seamlessly.

That seamless transition is the key. Hardware and software developers need to deliver on this. And as leaders evaluating these investments, this is the question to ask: does this integrate into how we already work, or does it create a parallel workflow? If it's the latter, your teams won't adopt it. Not because they don't see the value, but because the friction is too high.

Organizational readiness is the real bottleneck

This is the elephant in the room.

About 90% of organizations are not ready for immersive technology as a channel. Whether that's AR, VR, or even the advanced use of 3D models and digital twins across the business. The internal workflows simply don't exist.

The 3D model needs to be treated as a real product. It deserves a virtual product manager. Someone who owns the lifecycle, the quality standards, and the strategy for how that asset gets deployed across departments. This isn't a file sitting on a server. It's a business tool with measurable impact on sales, training, and customer experience. The idea needs to mature at leadership level before the technology can deliver on its potential.

Where XR sits in your organization

XR should be centralized. Like IT. But not under IT.

The technology evolves too quickly for a traditional IT governance model. That approach would kill momentum before anything gets off the ground. And XR relies much more heavily on assets and content than any application traditionally managed by IT.

That said, IT needs to be involved on the hardware and infrastructure side. But by creating a dedicated XR or Immersive group, you give every department access to these capabilities without reinventing the wheel each time. Sales, marketing, training, product development. They all rely on the same core assets. Same 3D models. Same data. Different applications. One central team makes that scalable.

The metadata problem nobody talks about

This is the one that gets greatly overlooked. And it's the one that will determine whether your immersive initiatives actually deliver.

Accurate behavioral metadata of products. For any virtual demo to work properly, from a simple product configurator to a full VR training environment, the software needs to know how something moves, how it bends, at which speed, and how it impacts its environment.

In 99% of cases, that data doesn't exist. Even if you think you have it, I'm confident you don't. Not at the level required to make VR experiences feel real and useful. This isn't a technology problem. It's a data and process problem. The kind that doesn't get solved by purchasing better headsets. It gets solved by investing in the foundation.

Time to look within

As creators, developers, and hardware manufacturers, we need to turn the mirror on ourselves. If our core users find the friction too high and choose to stay with what they know instead of adopting, that's on us.

I'm not pointing fingers. My studio makes the same mistakes. We forget that we live in this technology every day. We have a deeper comprehension of it than the people we build for. What feels intuitive to us feels like a hurdle to them. And that gap is bigger than most of us are willing to admit.

Compare it to a car. Most people don't care how the engine works. They don't need to understand combustion cycles or transmission ratios. It just needs to work. When they need it. How they need it. Turn the key, drive, arrive.

VR isn't there yet. And until it is, blaming the user for not adopting is the wrong conversation.

So is it really winter?

The VR winter isn't about the technology dying. It's about the industry taking a breath. Resetting expectations. And hopefully, building the foundations that should have been there from the start.

The technology works. The use cases are real. The value is proven when done right. What's missing is the organizational maturity, the workflow integration, and the willingness to treat this as a strategic investment rather than a one-off experiment.

And that word strategic matters. You can't just throw these technologies on the stack and hope it will all work out. That's how you end up with expensive hardware collecting dust in a closet. Strategy is required. Understand what you have. Understand how it is used. Then figure out how these new approaches can amplify your current ones. Not replace. Amplify. That's where the real value lives.

If that's what this winter is about, then bring it on. Because what comes after will be worth the wait.

Related: how a forklift training simulator trains drivers with nothing real to break.