Thursday, December 13, 2018

IMAX Shutters Virtual Reality Effort, Flagship LA VR Location

Big screen movie theater operator IMAX is shutting down all of its virtual reality theater locations, including its flagship location in Los Angeles, the company said in a regulatory filing on Thursday--not a good sign for companies hoping to make location-based virtual reality a business. According to IMAX, it has decided to close all of its remaining VR locations, and write of certain VR content investments, taking a one-time impairment charge of $6.9 million in its fourth quarter of 2018. IMAX had launched itself the IMAX VR Los Angeles location across from The Grove in January of 2017, offering up an immersive VR location that allowed users to experience a menu of different virtual reality titles. IMAX had already shuttered four other of its seven VR locations earlier in the year.