Unnamed sources at Samsung suggest the company is developing a Google Glass competitor, currently named Galaxy Glass, that could possibly debut at September’s IFA trade show in Berlin. Google Glass is expected to be commercially available the latter half of this year. According to a Samsung official: “It will be interesting to see which companies get better stakes in the race for smart glasses. Players definitely want to enjoy a ‘first-mover’ advantage in this new and highly lucrative market.”

“The market potential for smart glass is huge,” the official told The Korea Times. “It will be used in trucks, cars and has a greater impact on related industries such as glass- and coatings-makers.”

“The tone of this disclosure is very similar to what Samsung had to say before the unveiling of its Galaxy Gear smartwatch, which was the company’s big novelty at last year’s IFA,” reports The Verge. “The goal for the Korean giant is evidently to establish a first-mover advantage in the wearable sector, disregarding how profitable those early efforts may be.”

“As for what Samsung Glass would do, it sounds like it would essentially provide a basic heads-up display for your smartphone on your face, pushing notifications, music playback information and basic controls to the lens of a head-mounted display,” adds TechCrunch.

Sony is also planning to upgrade its own smart glasses, according to company reps at CES earlier this month. Wearables represented a major trend at the show. The Korea Information Society Development Institute predicts the wearables market to expand to $6 billion by 2016.

Related Stories:
Google Glass Finally Works with Prescription Glasses, Frames Cost $225, Ars Technica, 1/28/14
Google Glass to Be Covered by Vision Care Insurer VSP, The New York Times, 1/28/14