Google in Talks to Create Prescription Lenses, Designs for Google Glass; Internet Giant Exploring Ways to Put High-Tech Eyewear in Optometry Offices

Google in Talks to Create Prescription Lenses, Designs for Google Glass

Internet Giant Exploring Ways to Put High-Tech Eyewear in Optometry Offices

THEO FRANCIS and ROLFE WINKLER

Updated Nov. 22, 2013 5:52 p.m. ET

Google Inc. GOOG -0.21% ‘s new computer-powered glasses haven’t hit the shelves yet, but already efforts are afoot to keep them from becoming just a niche product for nerds. In a sign the eyeware industry and Google see a broader market for the technology, the Internet search giant is exploring ideas with at least one eyewear company to put the device in optometry offices around the country and create alternative designs.VSP Global—a nationwide vision benefits provider that also makes frames and lenses—is talking with Google about making more fashionable frames for the device, developing special prescription lenses to use with Glass and training optometrists to fit the device for customers, VSP Chief Executive Rob Lynch said.

The discussions are in early stages, and so far, the companies have no formal agreement. But VSP, which provides a vision plan for Google’s employees, would be a useful partner for taking Glass to Main Street. The company has a network of 30,000 eye doctors, and 60 million people are enrolled in VSP’s workplace and individual vision plans.

“Down the road I think this technology is going to blow up,” says Matt Alpert, an optometrist in Woodland Hills, Ca., who is on the board of VSP Global and is an early tester of Google Glass. “As soon as apps are developed that are relevant for your world, it will start to take off.”

The miniature computer is worn like lensless glasses and puts a tiny computer screen at the upper right-hand edge of the user’s vision. It largely responds to voice commands.

Aficionados who snap up new technology as soon as it becomes available are already hotly anticipating the device. But to reach a broader market, Google has to clear several hurdles, among them taming the device’s geeky image and adapting it for the more than 110 million Americans who are already wearing glasses to correct their vision.

Google has previously said it is working on frames that will allow for prescription lenses. The talks with VSP appear to be more extensive, however, involving discussions of distribution channels as well as specialized corrective lenses, according to people familiar with the talks.

Google Glass comes without lenses, so it’s theoretically possible to wear the device with regular glasses. But the experience isn’t great, people who obtained early models for testing said.

Another hurdle will be creating versions of the eyewear that consumers are comfortable wearing. “In its current form, it’ll be more of a niche early adopter product,” says Dr. Alpert.

If those hurdles can be cleared, Google Glass could find a bigger market. Early testers see lots of uses for the device.

One of those testers, Max Wood, chief of the volunteer fire department in Gray, Ga., said he’s excited about using Glass to enable commanders to relay information to firefighters at a fire, directing them to a missing child, for example. But that would require a version of the eyewear that would fit inside a sealed oxygen mask.

“The form factor is doable,” Mr. Wood says. “I would hope that they would possibly entertain a change for that.”

To spur new uses, Google this week released a new kit for software developers, giving them access to more of the eyewear’s digital features.

Ultimately, some of the bigger hurdles to wide adoption could be social. Mr. Lynch, VSP’s chief executive, was wearing his Glass device at The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council conference in Washington, D.C., on Monday, drawing double-takes and questions from fellow executives.

But shortly before passing through a security cordon set up in anticipation of an appearance by President Barack Obama, Mr. Lynch decided to take the device back to his hotel room.

“It’s still pretty new,” he said. “Probably better not to take the chance.”