vivo halts AI glasses project due to inability to create differentiation | Exclusive from Smart Emergence

Vivo's hasty entry and exit also reveals the homogenization dilemma in the AI glasses industry.

Text | Qiu Xiaofen

Editor | Su Jianxun

"Intelligent Emergence" exclusively learned that mobile phone manufacturer Vivo recently halted its AI glasses project. This project had been secretly in preparation for half a year and had cooperated with several ODM manufacturers including Goertek and Thundersoft on demos.

A person familiar with the matter said that AI glasses solutions with audio - video and single - green display were all within Vivo's discussion scope, but the project was halted before a direction was finally determined. The reason is that multiple senior executives including Vivo's Executive Vice President Hu Baishan judged that its AI glasses "would be difficult to differentiate in the current situation."

Vivo has not responded to this yet.

Vivo's hasty entry and exit in the field of AI glasses also reflects the current challenges in the AI glasses industry. Although this category is full of imagination and is considered the most likely next - generation carrier to replace mobile phones, it also faces various practical difficulties.

First of all, as a head - mounted device, AI glasses have a higher hardware threshold than all other hardware categories. Even a small oversight in details can become the Achilles' heel that ruins the user experience, and there is no middle ground.

Many manufacturers have provided cautionary tales.

For example, AI glasses manufacturer "Sharge" had problems with chip selection, resulting in poor call quality and low video resolution. Its first - generation "Patting Glasses" triggered a wave of returns. The first - generation AI glasses of Xiaodu also had to be redone due to the same selection issues.

The CEO of an AI glasses manufacturer told "Intelligent Emergence" that "currently, there is hardly any product in the AI glasses industry that truly meets the experience standard," including their own.

Secondly, homogenization has become another major pain point in the current AI glasses industry.

Careful observation of a series of AI glasses released last year reveals that most manufacturers basically follow the configuration of Ray - Ban Meta in hardware design, and the core usage scenarios also overlap, mainly focusing on functions such as first - person perspective photography, translation, and teleprompter.

The essence of homogenization lies in that, in terms of hardware, most domestic AI glasses manufacturers adopt the strategy of following the product route of Ray - Ban Meta, which has been proven by the market. Meanwhile, the domestic AI glasses supply chains are almost highly overlapping, and the mature public - version solutions are too similar.

In addition, in terms of software and ecosystem, the content ecosystem of AI glasses is too barren, and no real must - have scenarios outside of mobile phones have been found.

An industry insider told "Intelligent Emergence" that in the next three to five years, there is still a lot of room for exploration in terms of technology and content ecosystem for AI glasses.

After comprehensive consideration, some players in the current industry have chosen to return to rationality.

In addition to Vivo, there is also Xiaomi, which was one of the first domestic companies to follow up on AI glasses products. "Intelligent Emergence" learned from the supply chain that Xiaomi has also recently lowered its annual shipment forecast for the second - generation AI glasses products, from 300,000 in the first generation to about 120,000. Xiaomi has not responded to this yet.

However, the aforementioned person familiar with the matter said that although Vivo halted its AI glasses project, its senior management still remains on the sidelines. According to MacRumors, Apple's AI glasses may be released in 2027.

Halting the AI glasses project does not mean that Vivo has completely given up the exploration of new entry points.

In August 2025, Vivo released the Vivo Vision Exploration Edition, which features lightweight and natural interaction experiences. However, this product was not publicly sold and was only open for user experience.

Hu Baishan of Vivo previously mentioned the logic of its "second - curve" layout.

He said that in essence, MR is to accumulate data and verify scenarios for the longer - term robot business. MR requires high - precision spatial scanning and modeling capabilities, and the collected data will be the basis for robots to understand the home environment. In March last year, Vivo also established the "Robot Lab" and entered the robot industry.

For mobile phone manufacturers, the advantage of deploying the next - generation hardware entry point for mobile phones lies in that they have richer hardware knowledge, more complete channels, and supply - chain resources than manufacturers from other backgrounds. Their accumulation in the mobile phone era can be almost seamlessly connected to the exploration of the next - generation terminals.

But they also know better than other players the challenges of a new hardware product.

Cover source | IC photo

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