HoloLens drove Microsoft’s Mojang acquisition

Back in September, Microsoft swooped for Mojang and purchased the Minecraft developer for $2.5bn.

Now the corporation’s new chief executive has revealed that HoloLens was a key driver in that acquisition.

The augmented reality technology was unveiled earlier this year, with the only gaming application demonstrated so far being a version of Minecraft that spans across the user’s living room.

In an interview with the New York Times, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said this device was a big reason behind the acquisition of Mojang.

“Let’s have a game that, in fact, will fundamentally help us change new categories,” he said. “HoloLens was very much in the works then, and we knew it.”

Despite the intriguing premise of HoloLens, Nadella is keen to avoid predicting what impact the technology will have, pointing to recent innovations that didn’t prove to be as influential as their creators expected.

“I don’t want to overhype it like Google Glass,” he said. “I want us to be deliberate about what it is.”

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