What tech did the Army want to spend $400 million on?

Virtual reality (VR) technology is gaining traction as a valuable training tool for a variety of applications. But it’s not quite good enough to drop $400 million on just yet, according to the federal government. Congress has reportedly denied a request from the Army to purchase 6,900 VR headsets based on Microsoft’s HoloLens technology. According to The Verge, the biggest reason was issues with the current versions of the headsets.

Microsoft and the Army have been working on a contract for the company to supply the headsets, which the Army calls Integrated Visual Augmentation Systems (IVAS), since 2018. About 1,000 soldiers have logged roughly 100,000 testing hours with the current IVAS headsets, but their feedback is less than encouraging. Many have reported “mission-affecting physical impairments,” such as headaches and nausea.

So instead of $400 million to buy more of the current headsets, the Army is getting around $125 million, plus $40 million already awarded to Microsoft, to put toward developing an improved version. Called 1.2 IVAS, these new versions are still in development, but the Army has issued a statement saying it plans to place orders for them “after qualification and operational testing.” The Army’s contract with Microsoft allows it to purchase up to 120,000 headsets over a decade.