Facebook Is Teasing Experimental Apps Under the Name of NPE Team

A new brand of experimental apps for consumers is about to be launched by Facebook, under the label “NPE Team, from Facebook” (NPE stands for “new product experimentation”).
Precisely, the team will develop new apps for iOS, Android and the web, specifically designed for consumer services, and quite similar to Microsoft’s Garage group.

The company stated in a blog post that it “decided to use this separate brand name to help set the appropriate expectations with users that NPE Team apps will change very rapidly and will be shut down if we learn that they’re not useful to people.”

The concept of experimental apps is not new to Facebook, as the company experimented with products either launched or bought over the years, like Moments, Notify (for subscribing to notifications), Lifestage, Poke, Slingshot, Tbh, Moves, or Hello, among many others.

Of course, a team dedicated to experimenting with these products at a faster rate seems like a great idea, as it allows Facebook to try new things without the pressure or the concern that it would disrupt the entire company.

The expectations are not high and the company previously stated that it “expect[s] many failures” and they will probably give up the one that doesn’t look promising.
For the time being, there’s no information regarding the type of apps that the NPE Team will be launching or when are they will be arriving.