Google has pushed back the launch of its groundbreaking Project Astra AI technology to at least 2025, according to CEO Sundar Pichai's remarks during the company's Q3 earnings call. This delay comes as a surprise, especially after the tech giant demoed the project's impressive capabilities at its I/O developer conference in May 2024.

Project Astra aims to create AI-powered apps and "agents" that can understand the world in real-time, using multimodal inputs. The project's prototype showcased a smartphone app that could recognize objects and answer related questions, as well as AI assistants that could perform tasks on a user's behalf.

The delay is a significant setback, especially given reports that Google was planning to launch a consumer-focused agent experience as early as this December. This would have enabled users to perform tasks like purchasing products and booking flights using AI-powered assistants.

The challenges of building AI agents are evident, as illustrated by Anthropic's struggles with basic tasks despite its recent success in controlling apps and web browsers on PCs. Google's delay highlights the complexity and difficulty of developing AI technology that can seamlessly interact with the physical world.

The 2025 launch timeline gives Google more time to refine its Project Astra technology, but it also means that the tech giant will have to wait longer to bring its vision of AI-powered apps and agents to the masses.