The AgeTech Collaborative From AARP Helps Build Better Technology for Older Americans

The goal is to get these products into the hands of older adults who can use them. The Westners’ start-up, which produces high-tech glasses they’ve named Xander Captioning Glasses, went through the program in 2024. Other AgeTech accelerator participants include Braze Mobility, a company that makes blind spot detectors and back-up cameras for wheelchairs, and Prisidio, which allows users to upload documents to a secure digital vault.

Xander glasses show the wearer what people around them are saying in a written display on the lenses, akin to movie subtitles. They can transcribe up to 26 languages and, unlike other captioning glasses on the market, don’t need to be linked to the internet to function.  

“There’s no connecting to anything. No passwords. Just put them on, and they begin projecting captions,” says Marilyn, the chief experience officer and lead on communications and research. Her husband, who created the technology, is the company CEO.

The glasses give those who find hearing aids difficult to adjust to and those with total hearing loss the ability to follow conversations, even if they’re unable to hear voices.

Courtesy XanderGlasses

It’s a problem-solving product that hits a sweet spot in the AgeTech Collaborative’s mission: Almost 1 in 4 adults ages 65 to 74 have trouble hearing, according to the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. But only 12 percent of people who need hearing aids wear them regularly.

Marilyn has seen the problem up close: Her great-uncle, a war veteran, had hearing loss, but his dislike of his hearing aids meant the gregarious man she knew became withdrawn.

When the Westners entered the AgeTech Collaborative, they’d already been through other accelerators. But the collaborative offered something different: Advisors work individually with each founder to design a program that meets their goals. “It wasn’t cookie-cutter,” Marilyn says.

The AgeTech Collaborative offered the start-up a chance to connect with residents in senior living communities, assisted living and nursing homes who volunteered to give feedback on the glasses. From that experience, the Westners learned a few important lessons. They realized they needed to offer people a way to customize features. For example, some of those surveyed did not want to see swear words spelled out and preferred they be shown “XXXX” instead. Others wanted to know every word being spoken.

“We couldn’t have learned this just on our own,” Marilyn says.

Seeing is believing

Every January, the AgeTech Collaborative invites about 20 companies they’ve worked with to display their product at AARP’s booth at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. At the show, investors and retailers from around the country are on the hunt for the next game-changing product.

“Getting the attention of investors can be very difficult when you’re in a space that is targeting older adults,” Robinson says. When AgeTech first started going to CES, people often asked what AARP was doing there, he says, as if an organization advocating for people 50-plus wouldn’t be on the cutting edge of technology. But these days, AARP’s AgeTech Collaborative is well-known for showcasing innovative products. In fact, more than 700 start-ups, established companies and investors participate in the collective. 

Xander has been featured in AgeTech’s CES booth for the last two years, giving the small company exposure it couldn’t afford on its own, Marilyn says. A Today show scout spotted them and featured the glasses on the morning show in 2024. “Being at the booth bought us so much attention,” says Marilyn. “There’s something that’s legitimizing about being included in this with the AARP name.”

Not everyone can afford the glasses, which are currently priced at $4,999. The next model, launching in July, has a price tag that’s $2,000 lower. Marilyn believes the connections and exposure the company gained from being part of the AgeTech Collaborative will continue to help the company reduce costs, and allow the Westners to reach the goal they set out to achieve — to create technology that helps people thrive. 

 “We’d hoped that through the AgeTech Collaborative, we would find opportunities to raise awareness of our solution, so we could help more people,” Westner says. “That’s exactly what happened.”