Rumors credit Apple with a years-long effort to develop sleek smart glasses that would replace a smartphone in many ways. Chinese competitors are also moving in this direction, traditionally offering lower prices as compensation for simplified functionality. Smart glasses are being developed by several ambitious startups in China.
Image Source: Superhexa
The American Meta✴ Platforms, which released smart glasses in collaboration with Ray-Ban, serves as a kind of benchmark for many Chinese rivals. Xiaomi-funded young Chinese company Superhexa, as noted by the South China Morning Post, this month released Jiehuan smart glasses that cost just $98 but can process voice queries using an artificial intelligence system. Small speakers and microphones are built into the frames of the glasses. Superhexa founder and CEO Xia Yongfeng ironically stated that humanity has spent millions of years developing the motor skills of both hands, and it would be a crime to occupy one of them with a smartphone.
The new generation of smart glasses presented by Meta✴ Platforms are much more popular than their predecessors. In just a few months, more of them were sold than in the previous two years. Sinolink Securities estimates that by the end of this year, shipments of Meta✴ smart glasses will increase to 2 million units. Last year, shipments of augmented reality glasses did not exceed 480,000 units.
Chinese companies are now trying to offer functionality similar to Meta✴ glasses, but for less than their $300 cost. The Superhexa Jiehuan model is capable of playing music for 11 hours and, in energy saving mode, can wait for the next use for almost half a month, while the weight of the frame does not exceed 30 g. The proprietary voice assistant allows you to formulate requests for an AI chat bot and navigate the area with voice prompts , as well as translate speech from other languages. Users have so far noted that Superhexa glasses are not very confident in recognizing voice commands in very noisy places, which can be a problem for using them in an urban environment.
Last quarter, Chinese manufacturers were quite active in presenting their smart glasses, and Huawei Technologies was no exception. While such devices attract lovers of technological innovations, Counterpoint analysts believe that interest in them will quickly fade, since not all people need glasses, and their constant wearing, combined with not the most modest weight and limited functionality, can quickly get boring.
Hong Kong startup Solos is going to introduce AirGo smart glasses equipped with a camera this fall. The brand’s current glasses model lacks a camera and retails for $250, but weighs the same as competing solutions from Meta✴ and Ray-Ban. Chinese startup Even Realities equipped its G1 smart glasses with two LCD microdisplays, but deprived them of speakers. The device is offered at a price of $600, but allows you to work with visual information on the lenses. Singapore-based Brilliant Labs is betting on an open source approach with its $350 Frame smart glasses. According to the manufacturer, in this way the device can much faster gain a “mass” of compatible applications, critical for market success. Many Chinese smart glasses startups are targeting overseas markets.