South Korea's National Radio Research Agency (RRA) certified a new Pico standalone headset.
The RRA is South Korea's regulatory agency with responsibility over wireless frequency use, equivalent to the US FCC. As with the FCC, the RRA's approval is necessary to sell a device with certain technical capabilities in that market. Its certification usually comes a few months before a product launches, and sometimes just a few weeks.
The model number of the headset in the certification is A9210, the same headset that recently showed up on GeekBench with the same Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset as Quest 3 but paired with 12GB RAM.
The filing, shared by XR enthusiast Brad Lynch, shows the headset having 6GHz Wi-Fi support, meaning it features Wi-Fi 6E or even Wi-Fi 7.
David Heaney
ByteDance-owned Pico has yet to announce a successor to Pico 4, but it trademarked "Pico 4S" back in March.
Icons of ringless "4S" controllers were also found in the Pico Connect PC VR streaming software. Back in September images leaked on Chinese social media showing ringless Pico controllers, which appear to have the same design as the icons found in the software.
The Information reported in December that Pico 5 was canceled because Pico 4 sales "fell far short of ByteDance’s expectations". That same report said ByteDance does plan to release a refreshed version of Pico 4, but didn't give any detail of what changes it will bring.
David Heaney
In summary, the leaks so far suggest Pico 4S will include an upgrade to the Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 chipset used in Quest 3, a 6GHz Wi-Fi antenna, and ringless controllers.
As for what other changes Pico 4S will have, it will depend on ByteDance's priorities. Given it was reportedly disappointed with Pico 4 sales, it may want to cut costs to compete with the upcoming Meta Quest 3S. Alternatively, it may want to focus on convincing existing Pico 4 owners to upgrade.
We'll keep a close eye on Pico in the weeks and months ahead as the Pico 4S launch approaches.
