File photo: A pair of transparent Ray-Ban Meta 2nd generation smart glasses is seen on display during the Meta Connect Developer Conference at Metas headquarters in Menlo Park, California on September 27, 2023. Photo: AFP
Ray-Ban maker EssilorLuxottica said Tuesday that it extended a partnership with Facebook and Instagram owner Meta to develop smart-eyewear products after producing glasses that let users make calls, capture images and listen to music.
The world's top eyewear maker and the US tech giant, which have been collaborating since 2019, launched the first Ray-Ban Meta glasses, equipped with artificial intelligence, last year.
Paris-based EssilorLuxottica said in a statement that the two companies had entered into a "new long-term agreement, under which the parties will collaborate into the next decade to develop multi-generational smart eyewear products".
"We have the opportunity to turn glasses into the next major technology platform, and make it fashionable in the process," Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement.
EssilorLuxottica CEO Francesco Milleri said its work with Meta was "still in its early stages" so far and had been "an important milestone in our journey to making glasses the gateway to the connected world".
EssilorLuxottica acquired Ray-Ban in 1999 for around $640 million (R11.3bn).
AFP