Author: Zhou Yuan / Wall Street Watch

The Thunderbird V3 AI glasses were officially launched on the first day of CES 2025 (January 7th).

These AI glasses are not AR glasses, but rather capturing glasses, having previously appeared on January 2nd at the signing event of the exclusive Global Strategy partnership between Alibaba and Thunderbird Innovation.

The strategic partnership between Thunderbird Innovation and Alibaba focuses on Alibaba customizing the general purpose Qianwen large model exclusively for Thunderbird Innovation.

This model was pioneered by Meta. The VR headset devices "Quest" series 2 and 3 launched by Meta are equipped with their self-developed large model LLaMA3, with sales exceeding one million units for both.

On October 10, 2024, ByteDance launched the AI personal intelligent headset Ola Friend in China, which also practices Meta's model: embedding a large model within the GenAI terminal.

Of course, this model has already been implemented in AI PCs (including laptops) and GenAI smartphones, which are two core terminals.

When Bird Innovation launched this product at CES 2025, the determined theme was called 'Meta Beyond', clearly targeting Meta's intentions.

Let's briefly talk about the product situation of the Bird V3 AI glasses.

The SoC chip of these AI glasses is provided by Qualcomm, and the model is Snapdragon AR1 chip (launched in 2023, using Taiwan Semiconductor's 4nm process technology). The glasses weigh only 39 grams, setting a record for the lightest in its category, with a battery life of up to 7 hours.

The AI performance is reflected mainly in the response speed, which is as fast as 1.3 seconds (the industry mainstream speed is 4-6 seconds), almost imperceptible.

In addition to 'borrowing' from Meta in terms of the business model of GenAI technology, the price is also nearly 1,000 yuan lower than the popular Ray-Ban Meta Gen AI glasses, which are a collaboration between Meta and Ray-Ban with a million units sold.

Li Hongwei, the founder and CEO of Bird Innovation, stated at the launch conference, 'For us, the goal is very clear: to let V3 surpass Meta in the experience of headphones, cameras, AI, and glasses, truly standing on Meta's shoulders to design a product that exceeds Meta.'

The potential of AI glasses goes beyond vision; it also challenges the traditional audio experience. The advantages of GenAI glasses lie in their reduced likelihood of being lost, a more comfortable non-in-ear design, and the naturalness and appropriateness exhibited in interpersonal communication.

As a pair of shooting glasses, the challenge lies in how the GenAI glasses can capture high-quality still (photographic) photos and dynamic (video) footage using a camera sensor that is only about 25% the size of a mobile phone camera.

To solve this problem, Thunderbird Innovation and TCL jointly built a complete set of laboratories, customizing optimizations for more than 20 shooting scenarios of the glasses; at the same time, this laboratory conducted over 200 optical performance tests on the V3, eventually developing the "Falcon Imaging" system.

The Thunderbird V3 is equipped with a Sony IMX681 back-illuminated small sensor, with a pixel count of 12 million; it utilizes the "ArcSoft Algorithm" (ArcSoft Corporation).

By deeply tuning the performance of these hardware and software, the imaging capability of the Thunderbird V3 has been evaluated by Li Hongwei, stating that "V3 achieves image quality comparable to that of 3000 yuan smartphones."

Customization of the Thunderbird V3 is everywhere, including Alibaba customizing the Tongyi Qianwen large model, custom 9*20mm large diaphragm speakers for the headphones, co-developing the imaging system with TCL, and collaborating with Qualcomm to fine-tune the compatibility of the Snapdragon AR1 chip for six months (semi-custom?).

This pair of glasses also features custom lightning-fast capture and long-duration recording functions: lightning-fast capture can be completed in just 0.8 seconds; long-duration recording can last up to 9 minutes, which is three times that of Meta.

As mentioned earlier, the characteristics of the V3 AI shooting glasses launched by Thunderbird Innovation this time are not the main focus of this article.

Wall Street Insights has noted that currently, the Thunderbird V3 is available for real machine experience in over 100 Doctorglasses Chain stores nationwide.

This seemingly unremarkable sentence is the topic for discussion today. Doctorglasses Chain is a publicly listed company on the A-share market. Whenever the market stirs up the topic of 'AI glasses,' Doctorglasses Chain can rise accordingly, and its stock price also surges with the wind.

What is the relationship between Doctorglasses Chain and the AI glasses industry? How deeply is it involved in the AI glasses industry? In which link of the AI glasses industry does it stand? What is the value point?

According to Doctorglasses Chain's 2023 annual report and 2024 semi-annual report, the company has established cooperative relationships with Thunderbird Innovations, ROKID, and Meizu, providing a comprehensive vision correction solution for the smart glasses consumer group through customized services and online-offline linked after-sales service.

It is clear that Doctorglasses Chain is positioned in the downstream channel segment of the AI glasses industry chain; at the same time, it is highly likely to launch vision correction lenses, eliminating the barriers to AI glass applications for a large group of myopic individuals.

The V3 AI glasses launched by Thunderbird Innovations will evidently utilize Doctorglasses Chain's offline sales network channels, which is currently the most practically valuable industrial significance for Doctorglasses Chain.

In the 2023 performance report, Doctorglasses Chain stated that the company has signed a "Cooperation Framework Agreement between Doctorglasses Chain and Thunderbird Innovations," and both parties agree to jointly invest in the establishment of a joint venture company. The registered capital of the joint venture company is 15 million yuan, of which the company plans to invest 3 million yuan, holding 20% of the equity in the joint venture; Thunderbird Innovations intends to invest 12 million yuan, holding 80% of the equity in the joint venture.

This joint venture company plans to develop the first generation of shooting glasses and audio + AI glasses products, and to generate revenue through a licensing fee model. In this collaborative project, Doctorglasses Chain will be responsible for offline channel sales and marketing, participate in product research and design, and have joint decision-making rights over key strategies such as products, channels, and marketing.

Currently, is the V3 AI shooting glasses launched by Thunderbird Innovations a product planned by this joint venture company? If so, then Doctorglasses Chain's AI attributes will have substantial progress.

According to the Doctorglasses Chain's semi-annual report for 2024, 'As of the end of the reporting period, the joint venture has not been established, and both parties have not yet contributed funds. Relevant information will ultimately be based on the approval and registration of the industrial and commercial administrative department. Currently, the research and design work has not yet started.'

After reviewing the materials, Wall Street Observation found out that the company jointly established by Thunderbird Innovation and Doctorglasses Chain – Thunderbird Doctorglasses Smart Glasses (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. – has completed its registration, with the establishment date being September 3, 2024, and the legal representative Li Hongwei is likely the founder and CEO of Thunderbird Innovation.

Therefore, it is likely that Doctorglasses Chain is indeed involved in the research and design work of the Thunderbird V3 AI shooting glasses. Consequently, the originally low 'A' shareholding of Doctorglasses Chain as a downstream dealer for GenAI glasses will be significantly enhanced, and its valuation will inevitably be restructured.

However, as it stands, apart from its channel value, the other industrial depth of Doctorglasses Chain remains relatively shallow.

As stated in the Doctorglasses Chain's 2024 semi-annual report, 'The revenue scale and proportion of the company's smart glasses lens fitting service are extremely small, and there will not be a significant impact on the company's operational activities in the short term.'