Quick Summary
It's ten years since Google discontinued Google Glass, but new smart glasses are clearly coming into focus. A new report says Google is about to acquire a leading eye-tracking firm and its technology.
It's over a decade since Google launched Google Glass, its ill-fated smart glasses system. And now there's growing evidence that Google is coming back to the market it left way back in 2015. Last summer Google teased what looked very like a pair of smart glasses in a promo for Gemini AI. And now a new report says that Google is in talks to acquire an important bit of smart glass tech.
According to Bloomberg, Google is in the final stages of acquisition talks with AdHawk Microsystems. AdHawk makes low-power eye-tracking tech, which it sells to multiple manufacturers, and as Android Authority reports, it's also developed its own set of AR glasses. If the Google acquisition does go through, it could help give Google a real edge in the AR department.
Why history won't repeat with Google's AR glasses
There were lots of reasons why Google Glass didn't take off, but the main one was that the tech wasn't ready for prime time: Glass was very expensive, very crashy, caused a storm over fears of privacy invasion and even had early adopters dubbed "glassholes".
Things look very different now, with the likes of Meta's Ray-Ban Smart Glasses delivering an experience that Google Glass couldn't. We've had ten more years of wearable tech since Glass crashed, and during that decade what smart glasses can do and how much they cost have changed dramatically. There's a growing number of companies in the sector now, and while Apple is currently taking a different approach with its Vision Pro its long-term goal is to make smart glasses too.
Google's in a much stronger position than it was when it first experimented with smart glasses. It owns HTC's former XR expanded reality division, and of course it has its own Android XR operating system for headsets and smart glasses as well as its Gemini AI platform. The prospect of an AdHawk acquisition suggests that it's not a question of if Google is developing a set of smart glasses, but when we'll get to see them.
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