Google initially launched Glass as a consumer device in 2013, but the age of face computers never arrived. There was an undeniable creepy factor when talking to someone wearing Glass, and society wasn’t ready for that. Google ended up pulling Glass from sale in 2015, but an enterprise version has continued to exist. Unlike consumers, workers in some industries actually have a use for a head-mounted holographic display. To accommodate those workers, Google today announced a new version of Google Glass for enterprise.
Glass Enterprise Edition 2 still looks almost identical to the Google Glass of old. There’s a long arm on the right side of the glasses, which houses the hardware and battery. The prism display extends out in front of the right eye up toward the top of the lens. The effect is like having a small display floating at the top of your vision. It doesn’t completely overlay the world like HoloLens or MagicLeap, but that might be preferable for some industries. The inside of the new Glass is, well, new.
The Glass Enterprise Edition 2 leaves behind the dated processing hardware of the old Explorer Edition. It’s now based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR1 platform. The XR1 has a quad-core 10nm CPU (the first of its kind, it would seem), a more powerful GPU, and a robust AI engine. The result is much better performance than the previous hardware with longer battery life.
The camera built into the front edge of the Glass Enterprise Edition 2 is better, but Google didn’t say how much better. The new glass also joins the modern era with a USB Type-C port for charging.
Google Glass is no longer a consumer device, but development is still important — possibly even more important in some ways. Developers from various industries need to be able to create custom applications for Glass, and the new Enterprise Edition 2 should make that easier. Glass still runs Android with expanded API support, and the new version adds Android Enterprise Mobile Device Management.
Google’s new Enterprise Glass starts at $999, which is by no means cheap. However, it’s a significant discount from systems with similar applications like the Microsoft HoloLens 2. That system starts at $3,500. Google even offers discounts for companies that do more business with Google. Interested parties have to go through Google’s enterprise sales representatives.
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