Biel Glasses creates smart glasses to mitigate vision problems

The startup Biel Glasses owes its origin and its name to Biel, the son of the project's promoters, Jaume Puig and Constanza Lucero. And the term Glasses responds to its objective: to solve the vision problems of Biel, a nine-year-old boy who was born with a visual impairment.

With no option for a therapeutic solution for Biel to recover his visual field, electronic engineer Jaume Puig was determined to find an alternative that would at least help his son to have the safest and most independent mobility possible. And so, thanks to his work experience in the field of augmented reality techniques, Biel Glasses emerged, smart glasses that combine augmented reality and virtual reality and make the most of the sensory capacity of people with partial vision.

The electronic device, connected to a mini-computer that can be placed on the patient's waist, recognizes and points out obstacles, changes in the ground, traffic lights... everything that can impede correct mobility. It even adapts the lighting of the areas being traversed and improves images with the zoom function.

The development of Biel Glasses, now in the testing phase with various patients, has been carried out entirely with the work of the team of professionals led by Jaume Puig, in collaboration with the Leitat technology center, the Faculty of Optics and Optometry of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and the Rey Juan Carlos University, in Madrid.

Puig explains that in the general population there are more people with severe vision problems than blind people. "For every seven people with reduced vision, many without possible correction because they are problems caused by the retina or the brain, there is one blind person". These percentages encourage him to defend the fit of Biel Glasses as a method of help, especially aimed at specialized opticians such as Centre Òptic Màcula Visió, BCN Baixa Visió, both in Barcelona city, or those existing in other cities such as Valencia, where Baja Visión Valencia or Óptica Sanitaria Alcocer are located. "In every Spanish city of a certain population density there are between three and five specific opticians for this type of visual alterations because they require tailor-made treatments for the patient," explains Jaume Puig. And, from there, he wants to transform Biel Glasses into a reference brand for this type of optical establishments.

With this purpose, Biel Glasses hopes to complete the studies and begin the commercialization of its smart device this year, thanks to a new round of financing planned for the coming months that could be around 800,000 euros. Previously, in 2020, it obtained 350,000 euros in a round led by BHV Partners, a venture builder that has focused on biomedical startups that provide solutions to the end consumer, and Wavecontrol, among other investors.

Biel Glasses, smart glasses that combine augmented reality and virtual reality and make the most of sensory capacity