Google has called on venture capital heavyweights Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers to spur creation of software for Google Glass, its wearable mobile-computing devices that resemble spectacles.
The search giant’s venture arm is joining with the Silicon Valley venture firms to share information about software startups seeking funds to build Google Glass apps, the companies said in a press briefing at Google’s Mountain View, Calif., headquarters.
The investor coalition, called the Glass Collective, is betting that wearable computers will grow into a platform for third-party software developers the same way Apple’s mobile devices fueled the formation of thousands of mobile-app makers.
The VCs will jointly fund startups that dream up new uses for Google Glass in areas such as entertainment, education and health care.
“The creativity that can be applied against this is basically unbound,” said Marc Andreessen, the co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz. “There’s hundreds of thousands of things people are going to be able to do.”
The three investors will use capital from existing funds to support the project and don’t intend to create a new fund or invite other VCs, said Google Ventures Managing Partner Bill Maris.
Google Glass has already gained support from large mobile-app developers, including Path and Twitter, which have begun looking at ways to adapt their services to the new technology.