I was chatting with someone today at work about whether or not there is potential in the AR wearables space, whether that's AR glasses or AR contacts or anything else that layers technology over your vision. We concluded that there's a great product hidden somewhere in that idea, and we have no idea what company is going to crack the code and find that product, but someone will.
But as I walked back to my desk, I realized I did know what company was going to successfully build this product. I shrugged my shoulders initially because I was thinking about the idea from a technological perspective; I wasn't sure which company would have the technological backbone strong enough to enable this AR user experience. But the more I thought about it, the less I was convinced the winner in this space will differentiate itself through its technology. I have high faith that Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and Meta all have the internal technological capabilities to build a half-decent AR mixed reality headset in the next five years. One of these products might end up being technologically superior to the others, but I don't think that's going to define who wins the category.
I think who wins the category will be defined by the question, "Which of these brands do you really want to have represented on your face?" People are more self-conscious about their face than any other part of the body, and people will represent brands on their wrist that they would never dare put on their face. When you frame the competition in this light, Apple wins in a landslide. Google, Amazon, and Meta are all respectable brands that generally have high consumer trust (minus Meta maybe), but they're just not sexy. They might make fine products, but I'm not convinced they have the brand image behind them to get people to start wearing this product on their face at all times (see "Google Glass.") Apple doesn't have that problem. People are proud to display their Apple affinity, and an AR headset seems like the next logical step of that progression right after AirPods, Apple Watch, and Honda Civic bumper sticker.
From a technological perspective, the AR headset space is anyone's game. But from a fashion perspective, the game might be over before it has even started.
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