- XPANCEO has unveiled a trio of smart contact lens prototypes at MWC 2025
- Technology showcased includes fully remote power transfer
- Other prototypes include a biosensing smart contact lesns, and a lens that can help manage glaucoma
A self-acclaimed “deep tech” company focused on the next generation of computing has unveiled three smart contact lens prototypes at MWC 2025, giving us a glimpse into the technology that could shape vision health of the future.
XPANCEO took the covers off its three prototypes, each one showcasing a unique technology that could feature in future “smart” contact lenses.
The company’s prototypes highlight fully remote power transfer (charging over the air), biosensing, and intraocular pressure sensors for managing and detecting diseases such as glaucoma.
Here are the three prototypes and what they could mean for the future of vision health. After all, we’ll happily wear the best smartwatches and smart rings, as tech progresses, it seems only natural that more and more ubiquitous items take on the “smart moniker.”
XPANCEO’s first prototype (and these are all prototypes likely years from production) showcases fully remote power transfer technology. Naturally, any “smart” device including a contact lens requires power from a battery or other source to run. This prototype technology offers twice the range of previous industry solutions, powering a contact lens wirelessly from a compact companion device such as a contact lens case you’d carry around.
Having literal electricity fired into your eye doesn’t sound like a great starting point for any smart health device, but XPANCEO says its solution puts out radiation levels similar to other common wearables such as the best wireless headphones.
XPANCEO’s prototype biosensor can measure body parameters directly from tear fluid. The lens purportedly uses nanoparticles to enable high-sensitivity monitoring of biomarkers such as glucose, hormones such as cortisol, estradiol, estrone, progesterone, and testosterone, and vitamins B1, B2, B3, E, and D.
While Apple is still trying to wrap its head around non-invasive blood glucose monitoring on Apple Watch, XPANCEO is proposing a decidedly more clinical sci-fi future where you can measure body metrics through tears.
XPANCEO’s third tech prototype is a non-invasive glaucoma management system. Using an AI-powered smartphone app and a built-in intraocular pressure sensor, the company says it can provide “instant, highly precise measurements” that can be used to detect early glaucoma before significant vision loss occurs.
XPANCEO’s other smart lens tech
XPANCEO also showcased improved tech for its smart contact lens featuring augmented reality, which no longer uses external image sources but instead features an integrated microdisplay that can show images previously only viewable through smart glasses or AR/VR headsets. Finally, the company showcased a smart contact lens for data reading using a wireless data transmission antenna to send real-time data from the contact lens to a smartphone.
Naturally, showing off these prototypes is world’s away from developing a contact lens that incorporates all of this technology in a commercially viable package that can be mass produced. But if XPANCEO can crack even one of these technologies for mass market, it might have a major health breakthrough on its hands.
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stephen.warwick@futurenet.com (Stephen Warwick)
