For a handful of the “tech elite,” Google Glass was a popular device that was described as revolutionairy. For the rest of us, it was an interesting gadget that was more controversial than useful and mainly served as a tool for identifying the “tech elite” that we all hate. That’s probably why Google more or less went back to the drawing board with the project, but according to Eric Schmidt, Google’s smartglasses plans are far from over.
Google is sticking with its controversial Glass Internet-connected eyewear because the technology is too important to scrap, according to Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt. Google stopped selling the first version of Glass and shut its Explorer program in January, moving the project out of its Google X research lab into a standalone unit. Ivy Ross remained head of the Glass team but Tony Fadell, head of Google’s Nest connected home division, now oversees strategy for the project. The changes sparked speculation that Google will abandon Glass. However, Schmidt told The Wall Street Journal that it has been put under Fadell’s watch “to make it ready for users.” “It is a big and very fundamental platform for Google,” Schmidt said. “We ended the Explorer program and the press conflated this into us canceling the whole project, which isn’t true. Google is about taking risks and there’s nothing about adjusting Glass that suggests we’re ending it.”
