Google to stop selling Glass eyewear

Bloomberg – Google will no longer sell a prototype of its Glass computerized eyewear for consumers, as the Web company moves the project out of the research lab and makes it a stand-alone entity.

Glass, the digital spectacles that people can wear to see maps and other information, is being moved under the leadership of Tony Fadell, who heads digital thermostat maker Nest Labs, the company said in an e-mailed statement today. Until now, Glass had operated under the aegis of Google X, the Mountain View, California-based lab that has also hatched self-driving cars and other products.

As part of the change, Google is phasing out a program called Explorer that made Glass available to consumers as of January 19. The company said it is working on a new Glass product and will continue to invest in a business-focused program for the eyewear.

“We’ve outgrown the lab and so we’re officially ‘graduating’ from Google X to be our own team here at Google,” the company said in a post on its website.

Fadell joined Google last February after the Web search giant purchased Nest for $3.2 billion. Fadell was previously an executive at Apple Inc., who helped develop products including the iPod.

While he will oversee Glass, the unit will still be led by Ivy Ross, who joined the company last year. Formerly, she was chief marketing officer at Art.com Inc., following positions at other companies, including fashion-handbag maker Coach Inc.