Hearing software awarded for personal amplification in assistive listening devices
Cambridge software start-up AudioTelligence has announced that its aiso software for hearing technology has won a Hearing Technology Innovator Award.
The company’s software received the Hearing Technology Innovator Award for Personal Amplification: Software in the Assistive Technology & Software category.
The award is part of the programme through which Hearing Health & Technology Matters (HHTM) recognises technological innovation and achievement in the hearing industry. This year’s awards programme saw dozens of innovative technologies submitted from companies across the globe in eight categories.
Jerry DeRosa, 2022 Hearing Technology Innovator Awards Program Chair, commented: “The goal of the Innovator Awards is to recognise the organisations and people who bring new hearing care ideas to life.
“Technologies being developed by companies like AudioTelligence are helping drive innovation forward across the industry.”
aiso for Hearing can be integrated into many different types of personal assistive listening devices including earbud charging cases and remote microphones. The approach separates individual speech sources while also turning down the surrounding noise.
The aiso audio processing technologies are the result of years of research into the most effective approaches for extracting clean speech signals in complex acoustic environments. Its flexible audio solution software can enable assistive listening capabilities on multi-microphone devices including smartphones. It is also ideal for real-time applications, such as video recording and calling on smartphones, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls, conference systems, and automotive infotainment.
Ken Roberts, CEO of AudioTelligence, said: “We are thrilled to receive this award, which recognises that our solution to the problem of hearing in noise is radically different from other currently available technology.
“By combining our patented Blind Source Separation and Low Latency Noise Suppression, aiso for hearing lets users follow a conversation seamlessly even in noisy environments. In developing this software, we have overcome the limitations of traditional audio processing techniques.”
Blind Source Separation technology is the foundation of aiso solutions. It improves Signal-to-Interference Ratio (SIR) by up to 30 dB and is uniquely valuable when there are overlapping speech signals, which is a problem that cannot be addressed effectively with noise suppression technology alone. It functions with “very low” latency to meet the demands of face-to-face communications in hearing assistance applications.
Noise Suppression technology reduces stationary and transient noise in speech signals, enabling it to increase the Signal-to-Noise Ratio and reduce listening fatigue.
The Low Latency configuration of the Noise Suppression is optimised to work in harmony with the audio source separation technology, enabling it to suppress not only ambient noise but also the residual noise from interfering sound sources.
Hearing health is a global issue, according to Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID), in the UK there are 12 million adults with hearing loss greater than 25 dBHL, which is equivalent to one in five adults. Assistive technology solutions can help support these individuals to hear more easily.