Valve just imported 13 tons of VR headsets in one day
Roughly 140 tons of Steam Machines should be in the US now, too.
by Sean Hollister
On June 10th, the German container ship Posen docked in Los Angeles after a two-week voyage from Shanghai. As Valve watcher Brad Lynch notes, it was almost certainly carrying the first mass production shipments of the Steam Frame, Valve’s new gaming headset.
Import records show that Valve’s distribution partner Ceva offloaded nearly 32 metric tons of “Virtual Reality Devices” on Valve’s behalf — or roughly 13 tons of actual product, after you subtract the roughly 3,700 kilogram weight of five 40-foot shipping containers.
A pause in Steam Machine and Steam Deck shipments, a flurry of VR instead. Image: ImportYeti
That’s the same math we used to estimate that Valve imported 50 tons of game consoles in two days last month — and since Valve is differentiating between “Game Consoles” and “Virtual Reality Devices” in its import records, we can be far more certain that the Steam Machine console is the device it was stockpiling before.
Speaking of the Steam Machine, Valve’s stockpile may now have grown to 141 metric tons, as that’s roughly how much “Game Consoles” product has arrived in 12,600kg containers since April 23rd.
And it looks like Valve probably received three shipments of Steam Deck handhelds in May, two on May 18th and one on May 30th, judging by how those containers had the higher gross weight of 14,500kg. That’s generally how heavy Valve’s “Game Console” containers were before the Steam Machine was announced.
We checked: They’re 40-foot containers. Image: Hede Hongkong Shipping Co.
And here’s the journey they took. Image: Searates
13 tons isn’t actually a lot of VR headsets, of course, but perhaps more of them fit into a container than the Steam Machine console. They each weigh 654g (roughly 1.44lb) with a pair of wand controllers; back-of-the-napkin math suggests we’re probably talking about fewer than 20,000 units right now.
There might not be that many Steam Machines in the US yet, either: 141 metric tons could easily be fewer than 50,000 units at their higher 2.6kg weight per console, not counting any controllers or cables.
Valve confirmed days ago that both the Steam Machine and Steam Frame will launch this summer, and has signaled that it had to rethink prices because of RAMageddon. Even if they’re pricey, though, they may sell out quickly.
