Technology Reporter<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n They look like an ordinary pair of glasses \u2013 but these are tech-packed specs.<\/p>\n On a Zoom call, Niko Eiden, chief executive and co-founder of Finnish eyewear firm IXI, holds up the frames with lenses containing liquid crystals, meaning their vision-correcting properties can change on the fly.<\/p>\n This one pair could correct the vision of someone who normally uses totally different pairs of glasses for seeing near or far.<\/p>\n “These liquid crystals\u2026 we can rotate them with an electrical field,” explains Mr Eiden.<\/p>\n “It’s totally, freely tuneable.” The position of those crystals affects the passage of light through the lenses. A built-in eye-tracker allows the glasses to respond to whatever correction the wearer needs at a given moment.<\/p>\n However, tech-laden eyewear has a troubled history<\/a> \u2013 take Google’s ill-fated “Glass” smart glasses.<\/p>\n Consumer acceptability is key, acknowledges Mr Eiden. Most people don’t want to look like cyborgs: “We need to make our products actually look like existing eyewear.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The market for eyewear tech is likely to grow. <\/p>\n Presbyopia, an age-related condition that makes it harder to focus on things close to you, is projected to become more common<\/a> over time as the world’s population ages. And myopia, or short-sightedness, is also on the rise<\/a>.<\/p>\n Spectacles have remained largely the same for decades. Bifocal lenses \u2013 in which a lens is split into two regions, usually for either near- or far-sightedness \u2013 require the wearer to direct their vision through the relevant region, depending on what they want to look at, in order to see clearly.<\/p>\n Varifocals do a similar job but the transitions are much smoother.<\/p>\n In contrast, auto-focus lenses promise to adjust part or all of the lens spontaneously, and even accommodate the wearer’s changing eyesight over time.<\/p>\n “The first lenses that we produced were horrible,” admits Mr Eiden, candidly.<\/p>\n Those early prototypes were “hazy”, he says, and with the lens quality noticeably poor at its edges.<\/p>\n But newer versions have proved promising in tests, says Mr Eiden. Participants in the company’s trials have been asked, for example, to read something on a page, then look at an object in the distance, to see whether the glasses respond smoothly to the transition.<\/p>\n Mr Eiden says that the eye tracking device within the spectacles cannot determine exactly what a wearer is looking at, though certain activities such as reading are in principle detectable because of the nature of eye movements associated with them.<\/p>\n Since such glasses respond so closely to the wearer’s eye behaviour, it’s important the frames fit well, says Emilia Helin, product director.<\/p>\n IXI’s frames are adjustable but not to a great degree, given the delicate electronics inside, she explains: “We have some flexibility but not full flexibility.” That’s why IXI hopes to ensure that the small range of frames it has designed would suit a wide variety of faces.<\/p>\n The small battery secreted inside IXI’s autofocus frames should last for two days, says Mr Eiden, adding that it’s possible to recharge the specs overnight while the wearer is asleep.<\/p>\n But he won’t be drawn on a launch date, which he intends to reveal later this year. As for cost, I ask whether \u00a31,000 might be the sort of price tag he has in mind. He merely says, “I’m smiling when you say it but I won’t confirm.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Autofocus lenses could help people who struggle with varifocals or bifocals, says Paramdeep Bilkhu, clinical adviser at the College of Optometrists.<\/p>\n However, he adds, “There is insufficient evidence to state whether they perform as well as traditional options and whether they can be used for safety critical tasks such as driving.”<\/p>\n Chi-Ho To, an optometry researcher, at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University has a similar concern \u2013 what if the vision correction went wrong or was delayed slightly while he was, say, performing surgery on someone?<\/p>\n “But I think in terms of general use having something that allows autofocusing is a good idea,” he adds.<\/p>\n Mr Eiden notes that the first version of his company’s lenses will not alter the entire lens area. “One can always glance over the dynamic area,” he says. If wholly self-adjusting lenses emerge then safety will become “a much more serious business”, he adds.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n In 2013, UK firm Adlens released glasses that allowed wearers to manually change the optical power of the lenses via a small dial on the frames. These lenses contained a fluid-filled membrane, which when compressed in response to dial adjustments would alter its curvature.<\/p>\n Adlens’ current chief executive Rob Stevens says the specs sold for $1,250 (\u00a3920) in the US and were “well received by consumers” but not so much by opticians, which he says “strangled sales”.<\/p>\n Since then, technology has moved on and the concept of lenses that refocus themselves automatically, without manual interventions, has emerged.<\/p>\n Like IXI and other companies, Adlens is working on glasses that do this. However, Mr Stevens declines to confirm a launch date.<\/p>\n Joshua Silver, an Oxford University physicist, founded Adlens but no longer works for the company.<\/p>\n He came up with the idea of fluid-filled adjustable lenses back in 1985 and developed glasses that could be tuned to the wearer’s needs and then permanently set to that prescription.<\/p>\n Such lenses have enabled roughly 100,000 people in 20 countries to access vision correcting technology. Prof Silver is currently seeking investment for a venture called Vision, which would further rollout these glasses.<\/p>\n As for more expensive, electronics-filled auto-focus specs, he questions whether they will have broad appeal: “Wouldn’t [people] just go and buy reading glasses, which would more or less do the same thing for them?”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Other specs tech is even slowing down the progression of eye conditions such as myopia, beyond just correcting for them.<\/p>\n Prof To has developed glasses lenses<\/a> that have a honeycomb-like ring in them. Light passing through the centre of the ring, focused as normal, reaches the wearer’s retina and allows them to see clearly.<\/p>\n However, light passing through the ring itself is defocused slightly meaning that the peripheral retina gets a slightly blurred image<\/a>.<\/p>\n This appears to slow improper eyeball growth in children, which Prof To says cuts the rate of short-sightedness progression by 60%. Glasses with this technology are now in use in more than 30 countries, he adds.<\/p>\n British firm SightGlass has a slightly different approach \u2013 glasses that gently reduce the contrast of someone’s vision to similarly affect eye growth and myopia progression.<\/p>\n While autofocus glasses and other high-tech solutions may have promise, Prof To has an even bigger goal: glasses that don’t just slow down myopia but actually reverse it slightly \u2013 a tantalising prospect that could improve the vision of potentially billions of people.<\/p>\n “There is growing evidence that you can do it,” teases Prof To.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"IXI](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/a8d1\/live\/c37140d0-414a-11f0-835b-310c7b938e84.png.webp\")
IXI<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n![](\"https:\/\/static.files.bbci.co.uk\/bbcdotcom\/web\/20250701-150711-e3d94715db-web-2.24.1-1\/grey-placeholder.png\")
![\"IXI](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/ea08\/live\/fcda8160-41e5-11f0-ae42-c9936551965a.jpg.webp\")
IXI<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"Getty](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/7b76\/live\/251892a0-414d-11f0-bace-e1270fc31f5e.jpg.webp\")
Getty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"Hong](\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/480\/cpsprodpb\/881a\/live\/3756e680-414b-11f0-835b-310c7b938e84.jpg.webp\")
Hong Kong Polytechnic University<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n