As demand for AR glasses continues to surge worldwide, Morphotonics is scaling up its waveguide nanoimprint technology to meet the growing need for high-yield production. With a new branch in China, the Dutch company aims to achieve over 90–95% yield rates and accelerate mass adoption of waveguide-based AR displays.
Waveguide AR Glasses: The next leap in consumer wearables
If asked which new terminal is most promising in the AI era, most people would probably answer AI/AR glasses. In recent years, with the maturity of technology, coupled with declining costs and expanding applications, AR glasses have become a new favorite in the market, attracting numerous industry giants and entrepreneurs to join the field (Market US, 2025).
According to the latest report released by market research firm CINNO Research, in the first half of 2025, sales of consumer-grade AI/AR glasses in China reached 262,000 units, a year-on-year increase of 73%, hitting a record high. The firm predicts that China’s AI/AR glasses shipments will reach 900,000 units in 2025, a year-on-year surge of 133%, and the industry is expected to exceed the 100-billion-yuan scale within three years.
It is worth noting that due to different technical routes, current AI/AR glasses vary in target application scenarios and consumer groups. For example, products like Meta’s glasses focus on shooting and AI functions but still lack the display capability required for true AR glasses. There are two mainstream technical routes for AR glasses: one is the BirdBath (BB) solution, which needs to connect to external devices such as smartphones and PCs or be equipped with a dedicated host, making it more suitable for video viewing or office work; the other is the waveguide route, which offers higher light transmittance and supports standalone use with an integrated body. Waveguide AR glasses are widely seen as the most mature and future-ready form of the technology, offering true portability and integration.
Technology points out that with the advancement and mass production of waveguide technology, the high-end AR glasses market will gradually be dominated by slimmer, more glasses-like waveguide solutions, while BirdBath technology solutions will focus on the cost-effective and low-end market segments.
From the current rhythm of new product launches, driven by AI, more companies have begun to focus on promoting waveguide AR glasses. At the same time, the growth of end products is also driving the development of the upstream supply chain. Well-known companies such as Goertek and Lens Technology have publicly stated that they are increasing investment in this field. Notably, as a core component of AR glasses, controlling the cost of waveguide sheets is also crucial. In addition to domestic companies, overseas equipment companies are also accelerating R&D and setting their sights on the promising Chinese market.
Morphotonics expands nanoimprint technology footprint in China
“China boasts enormous development opportunities in the advanced display and smart glasses markets. In 2024, the global advanced display industry scale grew by 17% to reach 219.8 billion US dollars, while China’s advanced display industry scale accounted for approximately half of the global total, reaching around 108 billion US dollars,” Bryan Hu, General Manager of Morphotonics (China), told the reporter. “In fact, before the establishment of our China office in Suzhou, Morphotonics had already entered the Chinese market many years ago—our nanoimprint equipment has been put into use in China to serve local customers. The establishment of the Chinese subsidiary is a further reinforcement of our ‘China Strategy’.”
Morphotonics, a Dutch innovator in large-area nanoimprint technology, applies its expertise in waveguides and advanced displays to enable next-generation AR devices. Recently, to accelerate its development in China, Morphotonics established a Chinese branch in Suzhou. Its core strategy over the next three years will focus on three directions: “cost reduction, capacity improvement, and rapid response.”
Bryan pointed out that for waveguide smart glasses applications, the biggest bottleneck of wafer-level technology currently lies in “high cost and low capacity,” as only a small number of products can be processed in a single imprinting cycle. As for Roll-to-Roll (R2R) nanoimprint technology, its key limitation is that it cannot be directly applied to glass surfaces and can only perform imprinting on continuous materials such as films via rollers. Moreover, both imprinting precision and alignment accuracy are relatively low, posing significant challenges to production yield.
“In contrast, Roll-to-Plate (R2P) nanoimprint technology combines the advantages of the two aforementioned technologies. In the AR/VR field, it can not only meet precision requirements but also achieve higher production capacity,” Bryan added.
From R&D to mass production: Achieving 95% yield rates
Currently, Morphotonics’ fully commercialized products mainly include the Portis series (semi-automatic equipment), which is used for R&D and small-scale production, and the Aurora series (fully automatic equipment), which is suitable for large-scale mass production. Its large-scale automatic production lines have begun to be delivered to Chinese customers.
“We are also developing a new machine specifically for the AR field—’Cypris’—which can achieve an annual production capacity of 6 million waveguide AR glasses, helping customers significantly reduce unit costs,” revealed Erhan Ercan, Head of Business Development at Morphotonics. “In May this year, one of our customers used one of our current equipment for a two-day production run, manufacturing approximately 3,000 waveguide with a yield rate of 93%. Our target is to control the yield rate of large-scale production at over 90%- 95%.”
Currently, apart from Meta, no other company has been able to sell over one million units of a single AI/AR glasses product. The advancement of upstream supply chain technology is the key to accelerating the reduction of production costs and the popularization of AR glasses, but this will take time. This not only involves waveguides but also chips, cameras, optical engines, and other components.
In Erhan Ercan’s view, it is necessary to reduce the incremental cost of waveguides; the total cost should not double, let alone triple. If the initial price is only 20%-40% higher (than non-waveguide products), the market can accept it. However, in the long run, for further popularization, the price must continue to decrease. “We expect that from after 2028 to 2030, the global annual shipments of AR smart glasses will reach the level of tens of millions of units.”
This article was originally published by Du Zhiqiang on the TMTPost APP, with Zhong Yi as the editor.
