Apple veteran’s AI smart glasses startup Even Realities hits $1B valuation in $150M funding round

The race to replace smartphones with AI-powered wearables is attracting fresh investment. Even Realities, a smart glasses startup founded by former Apple engineer Will Wang, has raised $150 million in a pre-Series B funding round, lifting the company’s valuation to $1 billion and giving China another unicorn in one of tech’s fastest-growing hardware markets.

The funding round drew backing from Chinese technology giants Tencent and Meituan, placing Even Realities alongside a growing group of companies betting that AI-powered glasses could become the next major consumer device. Wang spent two years at Apple between 2016 and 2018, where he worked on the development and mass production of the Apple Watch and iPhone before launching Even Realities in 2023.

The Shenzhen-based company said Monday it plans to use the new capital to build its next-generation smart glasses platform, deepen AI integration, expand its global business, and accelerate product development.

Even Realities, the AI smart glasses startup founded by an Apple veteran, hits $1B valuation after $150M funding round

Investor interest reflects growing confidence that AI is moving beyond chatbots and smartphones into wearable devices that can deliver information without requiring users to pull out a phone. Meta has established an early lead through its Ray-Ban smart glasses partnership, and companies across China are racing to build competing products. Alibaba entered the market earlier this year with its Quark AI glasses, adding pressure in a category that is attracting both consumers and investors.

Even Realities entered the market with a different vision from many of its rivals. Late last year, the company introduced the Even G2 smart glasses, featuring a larger heads-up display packed into a lighter frame. It released the Even R1 smart ring alongside the glasses, giving users a way to control the display without touching the frames.

Wang has credited part of the product’s direction to lessons learned during his time at Apple, where hardware and software were developed as a single experience rather than separate products.

The company’s biggest point of differentiation is privacy. Unlike Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses, which include built-in cameras for capturing photos and videos, the Even G2 has no camera or recording hardware. Instead, it focuses on displaying messages, navigation, and live translations through a transparent display embedded inside the lenses.

“The future isn’t about pulling out a device every time you need information,” Wang said. “It’s about having the right information available exactly when you need it, while remaining fully present in the world around you.”

That privacy-first approach appears to be resonating outside China. More than half of Even Realities’ customers are based in the United States, according to the company. Roughly 80% of its developer community is located there as well, giving the startup an unusually strong U.S. footprint for a young Chinese hardware company.

Why Even Realities Is Taking a Different Path From Meta

The timing of the investment aligns with a surge in demand for AI-powered eyewear. Market research firm IDC reported that global smart glasses shipments jumped 167% year over year during the first quarter, reaching 2.25 million units.

Meta remained the clear market leader with nearly 70% market share, according to IDC. Shenzhen-based RayNeo ranked second, followed by Xiaomi, highlighting how Chinese manufacturers are gaining ground in a category that was once considered a niche market.

IDC attributed much of the recent growth to display-free smart glasses, led by Meta’s Ray-Ban partnership, which helped introduce AI-enabled eyewear to a much broader audience. Analysts expect the category to continue growing over the rest of the decade, with worldwide shipments of smart glasses, including augmented- and virtual-reality devices, projected to surpass 50 million units by 2030.

That outlook has fueled investment across the sector. Even Realities joins a growing list of venture-backed companies racing to define what comes after the smartphone. Its domestic rival, Rokid, reached a $2.58 billion valuation after raising $522 million in March, according to PitchBook. RayNeo, which was incubated by TCL Electronics, has a valuation of nearly $240 million, according to PitchBook data.

Even Realities has attracted backing from several Chinese venture capital and private equity firms, including CDH Investment, Monolith Management, and CVC Capital. Earlier this year, the startup raised another undisclosed round from Hong Kong-based Unicorn Capital Partners and Cyanhill Capital, laying the groundwork for the latest financing that pushed the company into unicorn territory.