Samsung Electronics is said to be the maker of the application processors (AP) that will power the ‘augmented reality (AR) glasses’ that Facebook has in the works.

“Samsung Electronics and Facebook have been discussing about this issue since the beginning of this year.” a representative for the industry who is familiar with this issue told Korean ETNews. “We found out that Samsung Electronics has recently started on the development phase on full-scale.”

The small AP will be manufactured using Samsung's 7-nm EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) process.

“Considering the fact that Samsung Electronics will have to go through many processes, we predict that the timing of mass-production will be sometime in 2021.” said a representative for the industry.

Facebook, which already owns the VR company Oculus, has introduced an AR platform in 2017. In addition, the company recently acquired a brain-computing startup company called CTRL-labs. Facebook has also registered a patent that describes the design of a potential AR glasses and is also working with eyewear maker Luxottica.

Last month, Facebook confirmed that it’s building augmented reality glasses, and it announced a project called “Live Maps” that will create 3D maps of the world. At the Oculus Connect developer conference, Facebook augmented and virtual reality head Andrew Bosworth said the company had “a few” prototypes of AR glasses.

Samsung declined to comment.