Chinese AI glasses maker Rokid planning Hong Kong IPO: sources



Rokid, a Hangzhou-based maker of smart glasses, is preparing to file for a Hong Kong listing as early as the end of April, according to sources familiar with the matter, as artificial intelligence-powered eyewear gains traction in the mainstream market.

The planned listing comes as global and domestic technology groups including Meta Platforms and Apple, as well as China’s Alibaba Group Holding – through the brand name Quark – Baidu, Xiaomi and Huawei Technologies, all rush into the market. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

A growing number of start-ups are also vying for attention, including Rokid, INMO and RayNeo, a sub-brand of TCL, while tapping capital markets to fund expansion. Xreal, a Beijing-based maker of glasses focused on augmented reality (AR), filed for a Hong Kong initial public offering last week.

Rokid did not respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.

Rokid was co-founded in 2014 by CEO Misa Zhu Mingming, a Zhejiang University and University of California, Berkeley graduate who joined Alibaba through an acquisition in 2010 and went on to lead an innovation laboratory there.

The company makes both industrial and consumer-grade AR glasses, as well as AI-powered eyewear, a format popularised by Meta’s Ray-Ban smart glasses.

Rokid’s AI glasses, which feature dual-eye monochrome displays, integrated cameras and audio, support real-time translation, a teleprompter function, conversational AI, navigation and eye-scanning payment.

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