Intel Processors to Replace TI Chips in Google Glass

An Intel (INTC) processor will run the next version of Google’s (GOOG) Glass technology in 2015, replacing the existing Texas Instrument (TI) chip and perhaps sparking both the chip giant’s wearable efforts and interest in the e-eyewear.

At this point it’s not clear which Intel chip Google will use to run Glass but power consumption and conservation will be a top priority, the Wall Street Journal reported.

With Intel on board with Glass, Google will leverage the chip giant’s market presence to convince customers in business vertical markets such as construction, health care and manufacturing to adopt the technology, the report said. In the meantime, Google’s Glass at Work group plans to huddle with developers to further the eyewear’s usefulness in those verticals and others.

Still, even with Intel’s influence in the market, Google regards Glass as largely a consumer product. Of the 300 staffers that work on Glass, fewer than 5 percent are involved in efforts to peddle the technology to businesses, the Journal reported.

But consumer interest in Glass isn’t there yet, and, in fact, whatever has been there may be diminishing.

Reuters recently surveyed 16 Glass developers and nine reported that they’d either stopped working on Glass projects or had walked away from the platform entirely.

“If there was 200 million Google Glasses sold, it would be a different perspective,” Tom Frencel, Little Guy Games chief executive, told Reuters. “There’s no market at this point,” he said.

Google’s commitment to Glass, despite pushing the eyewear’s consumer kickoff until next year, hasn’t ebbed, Chris O’Neill, Glass Business Operations head, told Reuters.

“We are completely energized and as energized as ever about the opportunity that wearables and Glass in particular represent,” O’Neill said. “We are as committed as ever to a consumer launch. That is going to take time and we are not going to launch this product until it’s absolutely ready.”

Along the way, Google has seen some key defections in the Glass ranks. Earlier this year, Babak Parviz, who headed development of Google’s Glass project and has been with the company since 2010, jumped ship to Amazon (AMZN). Adrian Wong, electrical engineering head, and Ossama Alami, director of developer relations director, also have left.

And, the Glass Collective, a partnership between Google Ventures and venture firms Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins, Caufield & Byers to catalyze a developer ecosystem for Glass, has shuttered its website and redirected users to the main Glass site.

With Intel in tow as a powerful partner, it will be interesting to see if Google sticks with its plan to push Glass to consumers or pivots to business vertical markets and positions the eyewear as a specialty item.