Glassless takes first place in Call4Ideas by Cluster Scienze della Vita FVG

An innovation call for the Life Sciences sector

The initiative is part of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region's programme to attract investment, support innovative startups and accelerate research, development and innovation in the regional Life Sciences sector. Call4Ideas identifies and rewards innovative solutions proposed by startups, spin-offs and SMEs, with a focus on technologies capable of contributing to the development of health, quality of life and the wider Life Sciences ecosystem.

Glassless was recognised for its approach to near-vision correction as a software problem. Rather than changing the optics in front of the eye, the company modifies the image displayed on a digital screen, pre-compensating visual content against the user's vision profile. The approach aims to provide a form of vision assistance through software, with potential applications across smartphones, digital services and other screen-based devices.

Recognition within the Life Sciences ecosystem

The recognition places Glassless within an ecosystem spanning biomedical innovation, digital health, research and technology transfer. The Cluster Scienze della Vita, managed by Polo Tecnologico Alto Adriatico, brings together companies, startups, research organisations, universities and healthcare institutions across the region, with the objective of strengthening collaboration between industry and research and creating new opportunities for innovation and business development.

Winning Call4Ideas brought with it a cash prize of €5,000 and the possibility to access the 2nd Call 4 Innovation, with individual collaborative projects eligible for funding of up to €150,000. The initiative is designed not only to recognise innovative ideas, but to support their further development and positioning within the Life Sciences sector: programmes under the same framework include Ideas 4 Innovation, which facilitates collaborative R&D projects between winning startups and companies, universities, research organisations and healthcare institutions.

For Glassless, the award represented an important recognition of the potential of software-based vision correction within the Life Sciences ecosystem.

“We are incredibly happy to have been awarded first place in Call4Ideas. This recognition is a testament to the hard work our team is putting into developing Glassless, but, more importantly, to the problem we are trying to solve. Presbyopia affects billions of people as they age, yet interacting with the digital world increasingly depends on being able to see clearly up close. We believe technology can offer a new way to address this challenge and ultimately help millions of people use the devices they rely on every day without needing reading glasses.”

From recognition to validation

The recognition came as Glassless continued developing its vision-correcting technology and progressing towards human validation. The company is developing a software-based system designed to pre-compensate digital content for presbyopia, with the long-term objective of enabling people to interact with digital devices without relying on reading glasses.

The Call4Ideas award marked an early recognition of Glassless within Italy's Life Sciences and innovation ecosystem and contributed to the company's progression from laboratory development towards technology validation across two human studies and commercial applications.

About Glassless

Glassless is developing vision-correcting software designed to enable people with presbyopia to interact with digital devices without reading glasses. The technology pre-compensates digital content for the user's visual impairment, with the aim of integrating directly into smartphones, applications and other digital platforms.