Apple veteran Michael Hillman is Oculus' new head of hardware

Facebook has appointed Apple veteran Michael Hillman as Oculus VR's new head of hardware. 

Hillman spent over 15 years at the iPhone maker, working as a product designer, senior manager, and chief architect on the company's desktop computers. Towards the end of his tenure, he moved into a confidential role within the firm's hardware technologies division. 

After leaving Apple in 2015, Hillman spent a year working at robotics outfit Zoox, before eventually being picked up by Facebook, which spent $2 billion to acquire Oculus in 2014. 

As Bloomberg notes, the move is interesting because Hillman has a history of developing consumer products at one of the biggest tech firms on the planet.

And according to a job listing for the head of hardware gig, that's precisely what he'll be doing at Oculus, with Hillman being brought in to "set the strategy and execute on Oculus' consumer product roadmap."

This is the second major hire Facebook has made in its virtual reality division this year. Back in January, the company made Xiaomi's former global vice president, Hugo Barra, its new VP of virtual reality.

"There's no greater calling in our industry than taking breakthrough tech and making it available to the greatest number of people," wrote Barra at the time, making Facebook's consumer VR ambitions crystal clear. "[I'm] really looking forward to doing just that at Facebook."