The rumored device, which is apparently called Project Moohan internally, is supposed to offer a mixed reality experience powered by the Android platform. It has reportedly been in the works since at least last year, following up with the vague ad Google, Samsungand Qualcomm made earlier this year about creating a mixed reality platform.
But the Moohan Project has become a “political headache” at Google. sources say Well-informed person that the partnership makes it more likely that Samsung will “call the decisions about product features” and that he doesn’t want Google’s other hardware divisions to know about the project for fear they might try to build a rival product.
It doesn’t look like Google is giving up AR glasses entirely
A report from the Departure from South Korea SBS Business suggests that Samsung is already starting to take control of the project. The company reportedly delayed its plans to start producing the headphones following Apple’s Vision Pro reveal, meaning we may not see the new headphones until the middle of next year.
Even with a delay, some Google employees apparently don’t think that’s enough time to make the device stand out, and one of them is telling. Well-informed person which “definitely doesn’t provide enough cushioning to come close to the Vision Pro.” This presents another hurdle for Google’s mixed reality plans, which at one point included glasses that could translate text in real time.
Although AR software leader Mark Lucovsky announced earlier this summer that he is leaving the company, it doesn’t seem like Google is giving up on AR glasses entirely. Well-informed person reports that Google is exploring ways to use AI with AR glasses and is also incorporating the Iris software into another project called Betty, which Google will use to “create a ‘Micro XR’ software that it intends to introduce to manufacturers that make glasses.”
According Well-informed person, Betty may be monocular, meaning she projects an image in front of one lens, but a second project, codenamed Barry, will use both lenses. The launch of Google’s AR glasses and XR headphones may be some way off, but it may not be a bad thing: waiting to see what Apple is up to could buy Google some time to make essential adjustments.
