The Glass Cable was a design for Google Glass which allowed the user to connect an external battery pack for extended use. It also featured a female micro usb on the underside of the connector so you could use your usb ear buds while you charged.

 

My inspiration for this came about when I though about the medical uses for Google Glass. Seeing as procedures in the theatre take anywhere from 1 to 15 hours or more, the ability to provide power to the Glass without interfering with the surgeon was paramount.

The first sketch of course had a coffee stain on it. All of the best ideas start out this way. Attention was paid to the ability to brand the item with a logo and to make sure that it didn't tug on your Glass when you turned your head.

After a bunch of usability testing and use case scenarios were worked through a simple design was settled upon and adjustments based on componentry and production capability were made to the design.

 

Packaging and presentation were also worked on and developed to best present the item in stores and keep shipping costs down.

 

With a BOM of $3.25 for the cable and $.75 for the packaging and printed material, keeping shipping down by not moving lots of air over oceans was important. I also wanted to keep the package completely recycleable and made from one material.

 

In the end a plastic film box with printing on it was decided upon. It had cutouts that the cable could be wound around and the end could be hooked into. All in all it was die cut from a single sheet and assembled with no adhesive.

3D prints were run off and components were hand soldered into a working prototype.