Palmer Luckey, co-founder of Oculus VR and the name behind the Oculus Rift, is departing from Facebook.
The news comes after months of silence from Luckey, bar an appearance to testify in a lawsuit between Oculus and Zenimax. Luckey seemingly vanished several months ago after he admitted he had helped fund an online pro-Trump campaign smearing Hillary Clinton in the run up to the 2016 election.
Well, that's now confirmed to be the case. In a statement sent to Wareable, Facebook said:
"Palmer will be dearly missed. Palmer's legacy extends far beyond Oculus. His inventive spirit helped kickstart the modern VR revolution and helped build an industry. We're thankful for everything he did for Oculus and VR, and we wish him all the best."
Read this: What Oculus VR's latest hire could mean
Last year there was a reorganisation within the VR company, with CEO Brendan Iribe stepping down as CEO to lead Oculus's PC division. Then, back in January, Facebook announced that Xiaomi chief Hugo Barra was coming aboard to take Iribe's job.
During all of this, Palmer's place within the company remained a mystery, despite Facebook insisting he was still working there in an active capacity. Wareable understands that Palmer's departure from the company was established as far back as January this year, but that it was kept quiet until now. Where Palmer goes next is unknown.
Despite his recent actions, Palmer will no doubt be remembered as the poster child of VR. Since he launched the Rift on Kickstarter in 2012, the industry has rapidly evolved, and when Facebook bought Oculus in 2014 it didn't just secure Oculus VR as a company, but served as a massive endorsement of virtual reality as a whole.
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By Hugh Langley
Now at Business Insider, Hugh originally joined Wareable from TechRadar where he’d been writing news, features, reviews and just about everything else you can think of for three years.
Hugh is now a correspondent at Business Insider.
Prior to Wareable, Hugh freelanced while studying, writing about bad indie bands and slightly better movies. He found his way into tech journalism at the beginning of the wearables boom, when everyone was talking about Google Glass and the Oculus Rift was merely a Kickstarter campaign - and has been fascinated ever since.
He’s particularly interested in VR and any fitness tech that will help him (eventually) get back into shape. Hugh has also written for T3, Wired, Total Film, Little White Lies and China Daily.