Qualcomm working with Google, Samsung for Apple Vision Pro-inspired smart glasses

Qualcomm, one of the biggest chipmakers, has announced it is collaborating with Samsung and Google on an upcoming pair of smart glasses that will work very similarly to the Apple Vision Pro. Company CEO Cristiano Amon said the smart glasses will be based on mixed reality, link to the wearer’s smartphone, and work as seamlessly as regular glasses or sunglasses.

“What I really expect to come out of this partnership, I want everyone that has a phone to go buy companion glasses to go along with it,” Amon said in an interview with CNBC. He pointed out that the upcoming mixed reality glasses could be the beginning of the trend where smart glasses “are going to be no different than wearing regular glasses or sunglasses. And then with that, we can get scale.”

How it started

Qualcomm, Samsung, and Google announced the partnership on a mixed reality-based device back in February 2023. However, the details on this collaboration and the device have been scant. Amon’s confirmation provides key information on what the glasses would be like. Without giving away too much, Amon said he was “incredibly pleased” with the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses, launched previously through a partnership between Meta and Ray-Ban. These smart glasses use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon AR1 Gen 1 chip. The upcoming smart glasses could come across as an upgraded version of the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses, focusing heavily on generative artificial intelligence (Gen AI).

Amon said Gen AI was the “ingredient that was missing” in the mixed reality headset market, and that is what Qualcomm could be working on for the upcoming headset. While Qualcomm may be behind the chip and technologies, Samsung and Google could offer their software and other tools to make the mixed reality headset as good, if not better, as the Apple Vision Pro. It may not be an exact rival to the Vision Pro considering the latter is a full-fledged headset. While Samsung is reportedly working on a mixed reality headset to undercut the Vision Pro, Google previously teased a pair of prototype AR glasses based on the upcoming Project Astra multimodal AI assistant.