OpenAI and Apple Join the Smart Glasses Race, Challenging Meta's Dominance

The smart glasses battle heats up - Apple and OpenAI tipped to be working on Meta-rivaling wearable

The two companies' products are several years away from launching If you've been following Apple rumors in recent years, you'll know that the company reportedly doesn't just want to just develop mixed-reality headsets like the Vision Pro and call it a day - it wants to create full-blown smart glasses that are indistinguishable from a regular pair of specs. Before now, that's mostly remained mostly the realm of speculation and leaks. But now, it seems that Apple is taking some solid steps towards understanding what it needs to do to make a set of augmented reality (AR) glasses that can compete with rivals like the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses. According to Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman, Apple has started conducting internal surveys of other smart glasses available on the market. The focus groups (codenamed Atlas) are comprised of Apple employees rather than members of the public to keep things as secret as possible (although that hasn't stopped Gurman's report) and see various Apple workers log what they like and dislike about existing smart eyewear. The goal is to help Apple understand what people want from a set of AR glasses and what sorts of features, materials and price points would work for its own device. Whatever the outcome, we may not see the results of these efforts for another few years, but it's the first sign that Apple is actively looking to break into the world of the best smart glasses. Rival companies like Meta have found success by offering relatively accessible smart glasses that may not be as technologically advanced as what Apple wants to achieve, but still offer users plenty of useful features for a comparatively affordable price. And it looks like another one of Apple's rivals is thinking of entering the smart eyewear market, as Caitlin Kalinowski, the former head of Meta's AR glasses team, has just joined ChatGPT maker OpenAI to lead their robotics and consumer hardware division (via TechCrunch). It's fueled speculation that OpenAI could be seeking to make its own pair of AR glasses. Kalinowski previously oversaw Meta's Orion AR prototype, as well as leading the hardware team behind Meta's virtual reality eyewear for nine years. Posting on LinkedIn, Kalinowski wrote: "In my new role, I will initially focus on OpenAI's robotics work and partnerships to help bring AI into the physical world and unlock its benefits for humanity." That all means competition could soon heat up for the smart glasses crown. With Apple and OpenAI looking to enter within the next few years, it could be a fascinating time if you want to see the next evolution in wearable technology.

OpenAI's 'iPhone of AI' may include Meta-like smart glasses

A major new hire for OpenAI may have revealed the direction of one of the company's more secretive projects, its first hardware consumer device. Last year, reports emerged that OpenAI had recruited Apple alum Jony Ive to help design an "iPhone of artificial intelligence," a consumer device that would bring the company's ChatGPT software onto its own hardware platform. This partnership was confirmed in September, with Ive revealing to The New York Times the involvement of his LoveFrom design company in OpenAI's hardware venture. According to Ive, he and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman believe that generative AI has made it "possible to create a new computing device" believing the technology can "do more for users than traditional software." The form this new computing device would take has remained a mystery. However, we may have gotten our first clue about the direction of this device after Meta's former head of AR glasses hardware, Caitlin Kalinowski, announced on X yesterday that they've joined OpenAI to lead its robotics and consumer hardware division. Kalinowski was previously involved with Meta's many augmented reality projects, including the recently unveiled Meta Orion smart glasses -- a pair of holographic display glasses that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg believes will replace the smartphone by the decade's end. Meta's smart glasses have brought mainstream success to the market thanks to the success of the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses and the hype surrounding Orion's future release. That success is also attracting some strong competition, as both Samsung and Apple are reportedly developing smart glasses of their own. Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon claimed during a September CNBC interview that his company was working with Google and Samsung to develop a set of mixed-reality smart glasses. Likewise, Bloomberg claims Apple has reportedly begun to take its long-rumored smart glasses ambitions more seriously after forming internal focus groups to identify what works and doesn't work about products currently on the market. OpenAI's procurement of Kalinowski could indicate that the company's dream of producing an "iPhone of AI" may involve them heading in a similar direction. However, if they are, Kalinowski didn't give too much away. In sharing the news of their hiring, Kalinowski stated "I will initially focus on OpenAI's robotics work and partnerships to help bring AI into the physical world and unlock its benefits for humanity." While Kalinowski doesn't outright state that they'll be applying their years of AR glasses expertise into OpenAI's consumer hardware division, it would be leaving a sizeable opportunity on the table given the increased interest in this type of wearable. It's believed that OpenAI's consumer hardware is still in the very early stages of development. Meaning that an actual product is unlikely to be released any time soon. However, if you're a fan of OpenAI's ChatGPT and can't wait to take the next step in bringing your favorite AI into the real world, you don't have to wait at all. While the Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses are locked to using Meta AI, there are other smart glasses on the market that have chosen to adopt OpenAI's ChatGPT as their assistant of choice, like the Solos AirGo 3 smart glasses. Solos' smart glasses are lightweight frames that work almost identically to Meta's, relying on a smartphone app to do most of the computing, with touch controls on the frame of the glasses providing easy access to talk with ChatGPT, control your media, or adjust volume. These smart glasses also include real-time translation and fitness and posture tracking. Plus, while you may be missing out on the built-in camera of the Ray-Ban Metas, a new Solos AirGo Vision model is expected to arrive in the near future to rectify this. These new frames will also make use of GPT-4o's multimodal capabilities to use visual inputs for prompts, allowing wearers to ask questions about things they see or for ChatGPT to more accurately answer questions with access to more context.