Long Beach, Calif. — Epson said its Moverio BT-200 smart glasses are now commercially available.
Epson’s smart glasses with augmented reality (AR) viewing apps, among other things, carries a $699 suggested retail and features a transparent binocular display that allows users to overlay digital content onto their real-world environment.
The BT-200 smart glasses are available through the Epson e-store and Prelaunch.com, Epson said.
According to Epson, Moverio smart glasses provide a full-featured AR platform for enterprise, Android app developers and early adopters.
Micro projectors located on each side of the eyeglasses project transparent overlays of digital content directly in the user’s field of view over the real-world environment.
In addition, the Moverio BT-200 glasses contain sensors such as a gyroscope, accelerometer and magnetic compass for head-motion tracking and hands-free navigation. A front-facing camera for video and image capture also detects real-world markers for AR applications.
Epson pointed out that AR smart glasses can improve worker efficiency in vertical markets such as healthcare, logistics, field service, energy, manufacturing, education, retail and more. Developers, including APX Labs and Metaio, have teamed with Epson and enterprises to incorporate the Moverio BT-200 smart glasses’ “see-through” AR technology for such use cases as retail and wholesale supply-chain tracking, surgical training for doctors in the operating room, and remote field-service support for complex repair assistance.
“Moverio BT-200 is Epson’s second-generation smart glasses and incorporates much of the feedback provided by both the AR developer and end-user communities,” said Anna Jen, Epson America new ventures/new products director. “With these improvements, Moverio BT-200 is poised to deliver an AR experience that will revolutionize workflow, training and repair in the enterprise environment.”
Andrew Vaz, Deloitte Consulting chief innovation officer, commented, “Wearable technologies present a very compelling opportunity for those organizations that want to push the boundaries of innovative design and technology applications. It’s crucial for organizations to build a baseline understanding of how wearables will impact the strategic drivers of their market, and find ways to use wearables in their businesses to gain competitive advantage.”
APX Labs built Skylight, the enterprise software platform for smart glasses that uses the Moverio BT-200 capabilities. Skylight uses the front-facing camera to stream real-time video feeds, enabling workers to get instant expert help; it uses the powerful motion sensors to enable completely hands-free user interaction, and it uses the rich overlay display to provide data right where work is getting done.