Vuzix has talked up the potential of AI assistants for smartglasses, as it continues to push its Ultralite platform.
The company unveiled its consumer-focused Ultralite smartglasses platform at CES 2023, which is designed to be a white-label product for brands to build on top of.
It weighs just 38g and has two days of battery life, and features a ‘fashion-forward’ design, according to Vuzix.
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The Ultralite boasts a 30-degree FOV display and can reposition text around your field of view so that it doesn’t interfere with what you’re doing. It’s designed to display messages, notifications, and turn-by-turn directions via the included smartphone app.
However, the company says that thanks to its wide compatibility with iOS and Android smartphones, the Ultralite is well-placed to hand off AI-based contextual searches and commands.
"Combining the amazing capabilities of AI-based programs such as ChatGPT and visual search with the true wearability and functionality of the Ultralite Platform puts it in a league of its own," said Paul Travers, President and CEO of Vuzix.
There are yet to be any confirmed partners signed up to launch on the Ultralite platform, so this certainly feels like Vuzix using the latest buzzwords to promote its product.
But it certainly provokes an interesting discussion about how AI could help solve the pain points of using smart glasses, to provide contextual information about the world around us.
The revolution in AI chatbots such as ChatGPT and Bing could help us contextualize information and deal with complex queries without the need to pull out our smartphones.
Examples could be queries on the move, such as, “where can I get a gluten free lunch near me” and have the answer presented to you.
But visual AI applications mean that users could be able to ask for information from their immediate field of view, such as pulling up the menu for a restaurant they walk past.
This could lead to wearables being able to provide more meaningful and helpful experiences and detach us from our smartphones.
Like the real-world benefits of smartglasses, this is still some way off, but AI could provide an important piece of the puzzle.
How we test
James is the co-founder of Wareable, and he has been a technology journalist for 15 years.
He started his career at Future Publishing, James became the features editor of T3 Magazine and T3.com and was a regular contributor to TechRadar – before leaving Future Publishing to found Wareable in 2014.
James has been at the helm of Wareable since 2014 and has become one of the leading experts in wearable technologies globally. He has reviewed, tested, and covered pretty much every wearable on the market, and is passionate about the evolving industry, and wearables helping people achieve healthier and happier lives.