Tadashi Shimizu is the Project Manager of JINS MEME, which is the world’s first eyewear that actually lets you see yourself. You can meet him at our conference coming up on October 12 in Hong Kong! But first, we had the chance for a brief interview with him:
What’s the current status of the smart glasses market? Where is it headed next?
I see there are two major streams in the smart glasses market – to look outside yourself and look inside yourself. The former, for instance, Google Glass, is for you to see outside your world with camera and screen embedded/attached whilst our JINS MEME has managed to position uniquely where you can see yourself internally with sensing your bio-data. In both streams, the key is a fine balance between size/design and functional features.
Your glasses look super sleek but still have technology inside. In terms of miniaturization of the parts what was the biggest difficulty that you had to face while building this product?
We believe JINS MEME is the world’s first product that can keep monitoring eye movement (electrooculography) in your daily life if not other complex and high-tech look devices. Our biggest interest, which was also the biggest headache, was how to balance a form factor as ordinary glasses and functionality as sensor device so that users are willing to wear JINS MEME every day.
What can your product track and measure? Are you planning to add new features in the future?
JINS MEME with a style of ordinary glasses tracks eye movement and body posture. Firstly, the technology of eye tracking is known as electrooculography and it has been used for long. Yet the conventional devices of electrooculography are mainly for professionally medical use only and not really seen in daily usage whereas JINS MEME enables users to wear as part of your face and fashion. Secondly, with the position of being right above your spine, JINS MEME has a great advantage of capturing body posture and movement (accelerometer and gyroscope sensors are used).
We are careful in adding new features such as camera or display. This is because JINS MEME’s concept is “letting you see yourself”. In the next generation, we want the device to be smaller in size and bigger in performance as well as a wider variety of styles.
Curious about this product? Besides, Tadashi on our stage Jins will be exhibiting in Hong Kong in October. So make sure to stop by at their booth to take a look at their brand new glasses! Register to the WT | Wearable Technologies Conference 2016 ASIA today!
