On October 18, 2024, the four-day global electronics technology event, CEATEC 2024 (Japan Electronics and High-Tech Expo), came to a close at the Makuhari Messe International Convention Center in Chiba, Japan. The exhibition featured 808 companies and organizations from Japan and abroad, attracting over 100,000 professional visitors and hosting more than 100 conferences. On the opening day, Dr. Fan Qinqiang, an Academician of the U.
S. National Academy of Engineering, inventor of Micro OLED and Micro LED, and co-founder and director of Lakeside Photonics, was invited to give the opening speech. Dr. Fan’s speech was titled ‘AI-Empowered Smart Glasses’. Drawing from his 30 years of experience in the development of hands-free head-mounted devices, he analyzed the evolution, current status, and pros and cons of smart head-mounted devices from their inception to the present. As early as 1991, the U.S. DARPA invited Dr. Fan’s team to design head-mounted computing devices that free the hands, and within five years, they allocated 50 million U.S. dollars to KOPIN Corporation for the development of key components – micro displays. Over the past 30 years, many major global companies have conducted extensive research and exploration in head-mounted devices, launching various forms of products, such as Google Glasses, Microsoft HoloLens, Meta Oculus, and Apple Vision Pro. Some of these projects have been discontinued, while others have struggled to break into the market. Dr. Fan believes that these products were either too eager for quick success or too ambitious, all violating the ‘Fan’s Five Principles’ he has summarized over the years. He argues that a successful smart glass must adhere to the following five principles: ‘Fan’s Five Principles’ One: Humanity First, Technology Second. For smart glasses to be accepted by the public, they must be lightweight and as close to ordinary glasses as possible. ‘Fan’s Five Principles’ Two: The presentation of virtual world information must not overshadow or obstruct the perception of the real world. ‘Fan’s Five Principles’ Three: Maintain the user’s awareness of both the real and virtual worlds; a lack of perception increases insecurity. ‘Fan’s Five Principles’ Four: Sound is a better medium for input, especially with the advent of generative AI, making sound the first choice for communication in AI smart glasses. ‘Fan’s Five Principles’ Five: Create for user value, not for the sake of creation. Current VRMR glasses integrate too many features, neglecting the balance between cost and user value. Dr. Fan believes that the various XR glasses available today more or less violate the above five principles, which is the main reason why XR devices have not been widely accepted by the public.He categorizes head-mounted devices into two types: Smart Glasses and Smart Headsets. For the first category, Smart Glasses, these intelligent glasses should aim to provide the wearing sensation of regular glasses, with a weight not exceeding 50 grams, allowing people to wear them anytime, anywhere, and for extended periods. He advises developers not to rush but to progressively offer value to users in stages.
Initially, they should provide value for ‘speaking’ and ‘listening’, enabling Smart Glasses to perform ‘real-time translation, phone calls, messaging’ and other auditory and verbal functions. The second stage of products could incorporate cameras, using them to replace the user’s vision and AI to replace the user’s brain, providing the ability to process real-world information, such as ‘reading newspapers, object recognition, and search’. The third stage could consider display implementation, but the display must not obstruct the user’s observation of the real world. Academician Fan believes that waveguide displays also obstruct the real world, violating ‘Principle Two’. For the second category, Smart Headsets, Academician Fan believes that products weighing less than 150 grams and priced under $1000 are worth striving for. Smart head-mounted devices should not be made into helmets; current MR devices integrate too many functions, making them too heavy and costly. The core value of these devices is to provide users with ‘an immersive 3D surround cinema experience, portability, and an affordable price’, which can be achieved with lightweight products. Academician Fan suggests that the display size of these devices should be reduced from 1.4 inches, 1.3 inches to 1 inch, combined with a large field of view Pancake optical solution, which can significantly reduce the device’s volume and weight, and greatly lower costs. For example, Hupao Optoelectronics has already achieved a Pancake wide-angle solution based on a 1-inch MicroOLED display, providing an excellent immersive experience. Finally, Academician Fan made predictions and prospects for the future of Smart Glasses. He believes that Smart Glasses will become popular first, and Smart Headsets will continue to become smaller, lighter, and cheaper. One day in the future, these two types of devices will merge, achieving a unified form, and at that time, Smart Glasses will be fully popularized, becoming an indispensable tool for people to carry with them. Japan is a stronghold for electronic technology and micro-display technology innovation and application. This time, Hupao Optoelectronics and its affiliated company Solos jointly exhibited a full range of products from MicroOLED micro-displays, Pancake optics, AI Smart Glasses, covering the entire industry chain from upstream components to display optical system solutions to terminal Smart Glasses, showcasing their strong capabilities in various segments of the XR industry.Hupan Photonics has showcased its complete series of MicroOLED microdisplay products, ranging from 0.26 inches to 1.31 inches, which can meet the application needs of current and future hot technology fields such as EVF, XR, and AI. Particularly, the exhibition featured the Pancake XR optical solutions of the NP93, NP95, and NP105 series, based on Hupan Photonics’ 1-inch and 1.3-inch microdisplays, achieving multi-field-of-view solutions from 93FOV monocular to 115FOV binocular.
The clarity and immersion of these solutions have significantly improved compared to those displayed at the Optics Fair, meeting the conditions for mass application and assisting downstream XR manufacturers in rapidly launching next-generation XR glasses products with leading visual effects.At the same time, Solos exhibited the ultra-lightweight smart AI glasses, Solos AirGo 3, which incorporates ultra-light materials and ultra-thin lenses, integrated with the ChatGPT artificial intelligence system, supporting translation in 25 languages, enabling real-time, barrier-free communication with friends around the world. Additionally, they showcased the prototype of the next-generation AI glasses with a camera, Solos AirGoV.
