Ixanas New Chip Breakthrough for Wearable AR Brain

Ixana unveiled its first Wi-R silicon chip, claiming a major breakthrough for lightweight, all-day augmented reality wearables by solving body-area networking challenges. The startups electro-quasistatic technology enables high-speed communication between AR glasses, sensors and compute devices with 100x lower power than traditional wireless.

The wearable brain vision

GeekWire reports Ixanas chip creates a "wearable brain" architecture where processing power can be distributed across lightweight nodes on the body rather than concentrated in heavy headsets. Wi-R connects glasses-to-phone-to-sensors at megabit speeds while using sub-nanajoule/bit efficiency, making slim form factors practical for continuous use.

Chip specs and advantages

The production-ready Wi-R chip delivers up to 20 Mb/s data rates with physical-layer security since signals stay confined to the body surface (10cm range). Unlike Bluetooth or UWB that radiate and drain batteries, Ixanas non-radiative approach eliminates interference between multiple humans wearing devices.

Path from Purdue research to market

Developed from Dr. Shreyas Sens Purdue research, the chip represents Ixanas transition from prototypes to commercial silicon following 3M seed funding. The company targets AR headset makers and wearable OEMs building next-gen spatial computing platforms requiring seamless, always-on device ecosystems.