This week, the Alibaba Cloud Expo and the Meta Connect Developer Conference were held in succession, with both giants putting AI glasses at the center of the stage almost simultaneously. Alibaba's ambition is to transform glasses into an "AI Agent handy entrance that can get things done anywhere, anytime"; Meta bets on the evolution of the hardware itself, aiming to make it a "next-generation terminal that helps you see the world clearly"; while far away in Cupertino, Apple has also been reported to be developing a new solution to "replace traditional optical zoom with AI visual perception." This hardware form, once regarded as a science fiction prediction, is rapidly evolving into the core focus of competition in the capital market and technology circle.
1. Alibaba: Leveraging "Capable Mouths" to Drive Local Application Ecosystem
Alibaba's approach is simple and direct: to make AI glasses an assistant that can help you solve problems anytime, anywhere.
The Qoder glasses version, launched in early September this year, is a vivid example. When you wear glasses equipped with the Qianwen or Leqi large models, you just need to say, "Help me find where this code has an error." The camera on the glasses will look at the screen from your perspective, identify the error, and even recognize handwritten sketches on a whiteboard, directly conveying the answer to your ear. This continuous questioning and on-demand chat-like interaction completely abandons the rigidity of traditional voice assistants that respond one question at a time.
At this week's Cloud Expo, Alibaba launched the N1 series: the base model features a 50-million-pixel first-person perspective snapshot; the more hardcore Pro version includes eye-tracking and iris payment that can be completed just with your eyes, and it is set to be released on October 13. Supported by local super applications like Taobao, Gaode, and Alipay, the previously released G1 and S1 have quietly won the dual first place in domestic AI glasses sales and online retail revenues.
2. Meta: Wearing the Phone on Your Eyes to Reconstruct Wearable Interaction
As the currently recognized most mature player in experience, Meta goes a bit further.
The Ray-Ban Display under Meta is most appealing not because of the micro screen that can display WeChat or text messages on the lenses, but rather its accompanying neuro wristband. The wristband worn on your wrist can capture subtle muscle signals from your arm, allowing you to change songs or adjust the volume with a simple thumb twist, completely eliminating the need to raise your hand to touch the glasses or pull out your phone, and in the future, it may even enable air-writing. Coupled with real-time subtitle translation and first-person perspective video call sharing, scenes from science fiction movies a few years ago are now becoming reality.
At this week’s Meta Connect conference, the next generation product line has also revealed itself: not only Luna, which has been developed with privacy considerations by eliminating the camera and relying solely on a microphone array for interaction, but also an upgraded version of the Ray-Ban Display that can display images on both eyes.
3. Apple Does Not Want to Fall Behind: A Bet on Screenless Form and Pure Visual AI
In contrast to Alibaba's rapid landing and Meta's high-profile appearance, Apple still maintains a high degree of mystery regarding the AI glasses codenamed N50, which is expected to officially debut in 2027.
Apple’s design thinking is highly differentiated: not only has the camera been transformed into an extremely low-key vertical oval design, but it has also completely abandoned the display screen, instead focusing on Siri's visual interaction—what you see and what you ask, the AI responds in real-time through voice, aiming for a screenless "seamless perception" experience. The camera's zoom method will also likely not follow the traditional path of optical lenses used in smartphones, but will instead rely on AI cropping and algorithm-based clarity enhancement for "digital zoom"—after all, thin arms cannot accommodate an entire set of zoom lenses that move back and forth.
4. Behind the Cool Features: Who is Really Supporting Them?
If we break down the "cool features" showcased by these giants, we will find that every impressive functionality correlates with a vast and intricate supply chain.
1. Chip Computing Power: Stuffing an Entire AI into a Small Box Weighing Dozens of Grams
To make glasses capable of understanding speech in real-time and perceiving the world in front of them, what is needed is extreme computing power compression. Qualcomm is widely recognized as the industry standard; both Meta and Alibaba have largely adopted Qualcomm's Snapdragon AR1 or Reality Elite platform specifically designed for AI glasses. Meanwhile, AMD and Nvidia stand behind this hardware revolution. The computation power for training and inference of cloud-based models is supported by them, continuously allocating this capability to end devices.
2. Display and Optics: How to "Stuff" the Image into the Lenses?
How to make a palm-sized lens not only clearly display images but also not obstruct your view of the real world? Himax's LCoS micro-displays are commonly used for mid-to-low-end solutions; Kopin offers a versatile range including AMLCD, LCOS, and OLED; MicroVision adopts a compact but relatively niche laser beam scanning approach. Whether all these precision optical components can be produced reliably and at a good yield largely depends on the capabilities of semiconductor process control and inspection equipment suppliers such as KLA.
3. Application Ecosystem: From Metaverse Experiences to Glasses-Free 3D Teaching
Having cool hardware alone is not enough; what ultimately retains users is a continuous flow of content and applicable scenarios.
In this field, Microsoft holds numerous AR rendering patents while developing a dedicated operating system; Unity serves as the foundational base for most AR applications; Autodesk has brought AR glasses to construction sites, allowing architects to see 3D building models overlaying the real world.
In niche areas, Roblox fills the metaverse with AI-generated content, Etsy explores shopping scenarios, and Immersion delves into haptic feedback aiming to provide a sense of reality in a virtual world. zSpace specializes in "glasses-free 3D" teaching scenarios. Students do not need to wear glasses; they can stand in front of the screen and use a pen to grab a floating virtual heart for dissection practice.
5. Collaborative Efforts Between Hardware and Software, Welcoming the Critical Point of Wearable Hardware
By organizing the complete industrial chain, it is easy to see that the terminal giants are responsible for storytelling and defining "what glasses can actually do," while the three hidden lines of optical display, chip computing power, and content ecosystem are the true driving forces behind turning stories into reality.
When the computing power bottleneck is broken, perspective optics matures, and application scenarios become increasingly rich, AI glasses may no longer just be a toy for geeks, but the ultimate terminal that will take over our digital lives in the next generation.
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