This week, Dave Kemp and Andrew Bellavia sit down for a conversation about recent rumors that Apple is planning to get further involved into the hearing space and whether or not the company would actually consider producing an OTC hearing aid.
Due to Apple’s massive size and cultural influence, they discuss how the company could positively influence societal perceptions around treating hearing loss and address stigma.
**Interested readers may also be interested in last week’s discussion on AirPods as a hearing aid substitute, with Dr. Nicky Chong-White from the National Acoustic Laboratories in Australia
Full Episode Transcript
All right, everybody,
and welcome to another episode
of this Week in Hearing.
I am thrilled to be joined by
the great Andy Bellavia. Andy,
thanks so much for coming
on today. How you doing?
Doing great.
My question for you is who’s the
host and who’s the guest here?
I guess technically I’m the host
and you’re the guest
on this one,
although I’m sure our roles will
continue to keep flipping
throughout the conversation.
Well
It’s a pleasure to talk
together with you.
You and I haven’t done one of
these in quite a long time.
I know it’s been a little while.
We’ve done them on the Future
Ear Radio podcast years ago.
But it’s been a little bit since
you and I have had a chance to
sit down and just kind of banter
a bit about some of the things
that are percolating in our
worlds and kind of where our
thinking is with that.
You’re one of the people I
most enjoy to hear from,
kind of your feedback and your
thinking about the changing
Hearing healthcare landscape.
So for today’s conversation,
I thought it might be a fun one
to discuss some of these rumors
that are coming out around
Apple’s upcoming AirPods
refurbish or next model that’s
coming out. So Mark Gurman,
who is a Apple analyst and
usually pretty spot on
with his predictions,
put out a piece for Bloomberg
back on July 2,
just kind of talking about some
of the different possibilities
that he’s hearing about what the
next iteration of AirPods
can look like.
And he basically suggests that
we might be seeing more
sensors added.
So something you and I have
talked a lot about in
the past is like,
the ear being this really great
home for biometric monitoring.
And one example of this would
be body temperature,
because your tympanic membrane
obviously radiates your
body temperature,
so you can gather that metric in
a way that maybe is harder
to do at the wrist.
So we might kind of see again,
that theme of
data synergy and being able to
collect biometrics from multiple
inputs and then kind of bringing
it all under one roof
a la Apple health.
So that’s one interesting
possibility that we should
talk through.
And then I think also just this
whole idea that they’re moving
further and further into the
hearing health market.
He said that separately,
Apple is exploring how it could
better position AirPods
as a hearing aid,
a 10 billion a year market
that’s ripe for reinvention.
Apple has already added hearing
aid like features such as
Conversation Boost
and Live Listen,
but they don’t have regulatory
approval. Last year. The US.
Food and Drug Administration
eased hearing aid
purchase rules,
allowing for over the counter
sales without exam
or prescription.
That’s created more
of an opening.
And Apple has and has hired
engineers from traditional
hearing aid makers as
part of this effort.
And he goes on to suggest that
they might actually have their
own kind of like pure tone
audiometry test that could
be done. I mean,
right now you basically have to
use like a third party in there,
like a Mimi or something
like that.
But you can kind of
see with Apple,
they lay the foundation for
future generations of hardware
with the software.
And I think if you look
at Apple Health,
you can kind of see some of the
clues that they’re probably
going to move further
into the space,
namely with this example being
the opportunity for you to
upload an audiogram into Apple.
So it wouldn’t surprise me if
that becomes more of a first
party application instead of
being reliant on third
party applications.
So I think it just continues to
suggest that Apple is probably
looking at moving further into
the healthcare space in general.
It’s wearables.
I think that’s kind of the big
use case that they’ve landed on
with both the watch and then I
think it’s a possibility
that down the line,
AirPods become more of a health
based tool as they layer on
biometric sensors and some
of this different hearing
healthcare features
and functionality.
So I just wanted to have you on.
I think it’s just kind of
fun to think through.
What would the ramifications be?
None of us know the answers to
what Apple’s actually
going to do.
It’s just $3 trillion company
that I think is worth
considering,
especially with their
AirPods offering.
So what are your thoughts here,
Andy,
in terms of how do you see Apple
progressing into the hearing
healthcare space? And just like,
broadly speaking,
what’s your sense of what we can
expect from Apple with regard to
the hearing healthcare world?
Yeah, that is, of course,
the question everybody would
love to know the answer to.
And Apple doesn’t do anything
for no reason,
so everything they
do has a reason.
And so when they integrated the
ability to import audiograms
from third party apps like Mimi
into Apple health and
then make use of it,
that pointed to a direction.
So in my mind,
it’s zero surprise that they
would then develop their
own hearing test app.
And maybe it’s initially just
part of the hearing health
ecosystem. In other words,
you can already monitor
your noise levels.
You can see on the watch what
the volume level of the music
you’re listening to
with Air pods.
And now you can get
a hearing test.
So you can basically have
a complete well,
not a complete because they’re
not doing digits in
noise or anything.
But you’re starting to get a
hearing health assessment as
well as tools for hearing
conservation. No surprise there.
The big question, I think,
is whether they formally go into
the hearing health space.
They have been skirting a line a
little bit where you can load in
a third party app and make some
tuning just based on, say,
Mimi test results.
Does that skirt the line?
We’ve talked about this before.
When you can get third party
hearing apps installed or on
devices which didn’t start out
as hearing devices in
the first place,
that’s tough for the
FDA to enforce.
But was that a precursor to them
actually doing over to
counter hearing aids?
That’s what we have yet to see.
It’ll take a redesign
of AirPods.
If you look at the
existing AirPods,
because they weren’t designed
for hearing,
you can’t get a lot of gain
before feedback out of them,
different reasons why,
but they weren’t designed
for that.
And so you have conversation
boost and just a little bit of
tone controls, essentially.
So what is the next step
and what does it mean?
I actually think,
and this is something you
and I can discuss,
I think if they do true
hearing features,
over the counter hearing aid,
if you will,
I think it’s more important that
they come out of the closet on
it and publicize what they’re
doing than the devices
themselves.
Because Apple has the brand
power to change people’s
perceptions. Think about it.
I think even the Gurman
article mentioned it,
how when AirPods first came out,
everybody made fun of the big
stocks and thought it was the
most ridiculous thing
in the world.
They changed everybody’s
perception,
stellar functionality,
integration with their
ecosystem,
and the brand power to make
people think that those
long stocks were cool.
They can do that for hearing.
I think that’s far more
important than the actual
numbers of people who buy it,
because it’s an OTC hearing aid.
When they tell people that
addressing your hearing is
something that all the kids on
the cool kids on the block do,
then it’s going to change
people’s minds about hearing
out. Yeah, no,
I think those are really
good points.
I think the first thing to
really think about is,
like you mentioned,
in my opinion,
what the OTC Hearing Aid Act
really has done has been to
really define what constitutes a
prescription grade hearing aid
and bifurcated the markets to
where you have that
it’s predefined.
And that’s kind of what
we’ve always had,
are these devices that are
medical grade FDA, grade one,
grade two medical device that is
required to be dispensed by a
licensed professional and that
is designed to treat moderate to
severe levels of hearing loss.
That’s kind of like,
in my opinion,
what the hearing healthcare
market has always been
catering to.
There are cases where you can
cite that obviously people that
have more mild losses or just
anomalous things that maybe
don’t just fit into that,
like cookie cutter, moderate,
severe, whatever.
But at the end of the day,
I think that has happened is
that we have this new market,
and people can say, well,
there’s always been.
The personal sounding
amplifiers, PSAPs.
And we’ve had this era where
you’ve kind of had these things.
But I think the point is that
they’ve never caught
on in a big way.
The people that are wearing
hearing aids for the most part
today are wearing hearing aids
that fall into that kind of
clinical grade device bucket.
And so I think that
because I think there’s a lot of
red tape that would
have to cross.
If they do want to
get into that,
obviously they’d have to
register their devices with the
FDA think there’s an argument to
be made that do you really,
as a $3 trillion company,
want to go after a $10 billion
hearing aid market?
So are there incentives there?
But I think that it still begs
the question of this
newer market.
And I think that the first thing
to kind of think through is
would Apple even ever market
these as hearing aids?
Just those words alone are kind
of like where that
stigma is rooted.
As soon as you say that people
have these connotations in their
mind of older adults geriatrics
growing older,
those are the connotations that
people have that have this
stigma baggage for
better or worse.
That’s just kind of the reality
of it. And so for me,
the way I think of it is if
Apple did decide to just
continue to kind of migrate
further to the border of that
clinical grade line and the
thresholds associated with that,
would they ever even position
them as AirPods hearing
aid version?
Or would they just be AirPods
version three with audio
enhancement tools like
Conversation Boost?
And I think that goes to
what you were saying,
which is I think Apple has a big
opportunity here to help combat
the stigma associated with
treating your hearing
loss more or less.
And I think that by operating in
that end with the people that
are going to be most, I think,
adverse to this whole idea
because the problem hasn’t
festered to the point to where
you really need prescription
grade hearing.
Know,
I think there’s a gigantic
role that Apple can play.
There is basically helping to
usher in an era where it’s cool
and it’s a different mindset of
how people view these more or
less hearing healthcare features
that reside in a consumer
product that might never be
marketed as hearing aids
or something like that,
but more around what they’re
doing with conversation boost
and just the way in which
they’re positioning these
features to look more like
their enhancements.
And the subtleties around the
way they’re positioning it,
I think is equally important
too. I completely agree.
And my bet we’ll come back in
the future and see if I’m right.
My bet is they don’t actually go
to market as a hearing aid,
that it’ll be an OTC device from
a regulatory point of view.
But the way they sell.
The features will be an
extension of what they do now.
Right? AirPods,
great music quality integrated
with the Apple ecosystem.
You have like the new model,
you’ll have adaptive ANC.
So the ANC characteristic
changes as you go from the train
to out on the street.
And then when you go in
a loud restaurant,
you’re going to get an ANC mode
with conversation boost and
you’re going to get some
assistance through gain
adjustments according to the
hearing test you took.
And it’s going to make
everything sound better in any
environment you’re in, period.
Never mentioning the
word hearing aid,
that would be my guess.
And they have some structural
advantages because one of the
things the present OTC hearing
aid players combat is the return
rate because they’re going to
market as hearing aids.
And so people are evaluating
them as hearing aids and if
they don’t work for them,
they’re going to turn them in.
And the return rates,
from everything I can tell,
are fairly high right now.
But AirPods are AirPods.
People buy AirPods because
they work okay?
Of course you don’t know what
Apple’s return rate
is on AirPods,
but I guarantee you they’re
nothing like the kind of 30%
number that’s getting thrown
around for the present
generation of OTC.
People are going to buy them
because they want AirPods for
all the things that
AirPods does well.
And they’re going to get some
hearing assistance at the same
time and it’s going to
be an added benefit.
And in the ideal case,
they’re going to build that
around messaging about hearing
health the same way they are
with other aspects of health as
they monitor through the watch.
So in other words,
AirPods are going to improve
your lifestyle.
Here’s how they’re going to
improve your lifestyle.
They’re going to protect your
hearing because of the way they
operate when you’re streaming.
They’re going to protect your
hearing because when you’re
using the external microphones,
they’re going to limit
the input level.
You’ve seen people starting to
use them as hearing protection
devices at concerts because
the ambient awareness
mode is pretty good.
And so they’re going to build
the messaging around that,
that these are also health
devices even before they
put other sensors in.
If they start to do hearing,
it’s going to be part of their
hearing health ecosystem.
Already have.
Monitor your noise levels
on the watch.
Protect your hearing
with AirPods.
Improve your lifestyle by being
able to hear better in
noisy situations.
That’s my guess where
they’re going.
And they won’t be so overtly
advertised as hearing AIDS
even if they are. Yeah,
and I think that point there
about kind of the adaptive ANC
and those kinds of features
I think can be positioned,
like you said,
as health features.
And I’m with you.
I think that the ability to
whether it’s just the.
AirPods or if it has to be done
in tandem with the watch where
it can detect loud,
sudden noises,
that it could basically
automatically turn on
your noise cancellation
to protect your ears,
I think is actually
really compelling.
And I think that’s just one
example of that use case that
could be we could see multiple
iterations of it where you’re in
a situation where it’s detecting
speech and noise, right?
So you’re at a loud setting,
you’re wearing these,
and then it’s got the
directional mics that gets
activated more or less
automatically.
So I kind of see that being an
opportunity that we could
see more and more of.
Again,
it’s this creep of the consumer
brands that are creeping into
the hearing healthcare space.
Because, to your point,
I think that’s actually an
extremely important detail when
considering why these consumer
first products might have more
success in this space,
which is they’re in line with
the expectations of
the consumer.
Which is to say that if you’re
positioned as an OTC
hearing aid,
your number one expectation is
that they need to provide some
value in that regard.
Whereas with AirPods and some of
these other consumer
first products,
the first thing that they’re
positioning toward is like the
sound quality, the comfort,
the fit for all audio that
you’re consuming on your phone
and then, oh, by the way,
they have these additional
hearing healthcare features.
So I think that it helps to
level set with the expectations
of why people are buying these
things in the first place and it
gives them more opportunity
to creep into the hearing
healthcare space because again,
in the eyes of the consumer,
I think it’s just like added
gravy. It’s like, oh, okay,
well,
I bought these things for this
purpose and with three
subsequent software updates,
it’s now capable of doing a
handful of new things that I
didn’t even know were there
when I bought the device.
So it seems to me that that’s an
important point to consider,
is like Apple and a lot of these
consumer brands, I think,
have a real opportunity to
slowly migrate into the hearing
healthcare space as
an added bonus,
rather than being that be the
primary use case that they’re
positioning you with.
Because I think that can,
if those things aren’t executed,
if those types of devices aren’t
executed flawlessly,
that can lead to some
dissatisfaction from the
customer and that might be the
root of the return rate.
Well, that’s right. And also,
if you lead with the premise
of being a hearing aid,
then you’re combating the
stigma denial factor.
So if we refer to the three
common reasons people talk about
why people don’t address
their hearing health,
it’s usually access,
price and stigma denial. Okay?
And so when you look at some of
the OTC hearing aids that
have been done today,
especially the ones that are
coming from the traditional
hearing aid companies,
they’re addressing the access
issue because you can
get them online.
And some of them are even
offering telehealth with
an audiologist.
So access taken care of,
but certainly not stigma denial.
If you’re going with a rick
design that looks like
a hearing aid,
just because I can get it online
doesn’t help that stigma
or denial.
You have to admit you have
hearing loss and you have to be
ready to do something about it
before you either go into an
audiologist or you order one up.
And not so much the
price either.
When you see some of these units
near to or above $1,000,
you’re starting to get into the
range where you can buy hearing
aids at costco and get them
fitted by somebody.
And so not so much price
a little bit,
but not so much access is the
big thing but that doesn’t crack
open the market because the
other factors are equally
important or as important.
And until you get it all three,
we’re not going to get at the
vast number of people who could
use some sort of hearing
assistance but aren’t getting
it right now.
And over time I would say the
traditional prescription hearing
aid companies have not chosen to
aggressively address that market
and so it’s left to the consumer
companies to do that.
And I actually think it is
a lifts all boats kind of
situation because if I get a
pair of AirPods Pro Four or
whatever version has true
hearing features in it and I get
some improvement even if,
let’s say my hearing loss is
already drifted into severe
because people are notoriously
unable to determine their
hearing loss level.
So let’s say they’re already
severe to get some improvement.
Now maybe as they get used
to them they realize
this is really good,
I wonder what else is there?
Maybe it’s worth going to an
audiologist to get this just so
but they’re not going to throw
away their AirPods in the
meantime because they still
work like AirPods,
they’re really good and their
music quality still sounds
better because they’re getting
it EQed for your hearing profile
and you can access Siri
and all the rest.
So I actually don’t think it’s a
bad thing that the consumers
companies come in and truly and
publicly build awareness for
hearing health and the benefits
of having your hearing
loss addressed.
So it’s good for everybody when
they do but it’s going to take
that to really crack
this market open.
I couldn’t agree more
about that.
I think that it is in a ‘lift
all boats’ sort of scenario
especially because of this
delineation between how
far they can go.
I think that there will always,
as long as the rules are intact
like they are now,
I think that there will always
be this bifurcation and there
will be this clinical market.
But I do think that
to your point,
the number one obstacle for
increasing adoption is I think
people become aware of how much
their hearing has regressed
and I think that.
Exposure event like people with
their consumer grade devices
with these subsequent updates,
or even just the hardware that
you upgrade over time,
it has these new features.
I think that’s such an important
aspect of these is like that’s
not really why people are buying
them. But if it’s an oh,
by the way,
and it gives people that
exposure to here’s what this
audio enhancement
sounds like,
that’s probably going to be more
effective than just about
anything is to truly be able to
I’ll believe it when I kind of
hear it type thing is like
giving people that first hand
experience of what this sounds
like is going to probably be a
lot more effective than
any other method.
And we know this to be one of
those types of health conditions
that just very slowly,
typically speaking, regresses.
And so it’s very hard to
actually detect that
this is occurring.
But if you had a way to
objectively do these
measurements and that’s
why I think, again,
especially here in the US.
Market,
with as dominant as the
iOS ecosystem is,
you have to look at the totality
of what apple’s doing
across all of its
you know,
the wearable ecosystem is
incredibly important to apple’s
future because it’s essentially
another moat for them to lock
the user base in for a greater
period of time.
Because the Apple Watch and
AirPods just work seamlessly
with the iOS handheld device.
And so I think know
because of you.
You can imagine a scenario where
as Apple Health becomes more of
a hub for all of your different
health inputs,
and you can see this happening
at the wrist right now
or with these rings,
these third party wearables,
where a lot of that data is
becoming accessible
in Apple Health.
And it’s this hub and this
repository of data,
I think AirPods will very much
fall in line with that.
And so you can kind of, I think,
envision a scenario where Apple
is a really powerful
vehicle for people,
like through these proactive
notifications.
It’s like issuing a hearing
test. And sure,
maybe this won’t be
up to snuff and at par with the
kind of clinical hearing test
you would get in an
audiologist’s office or
something like that.
But even having a semblance of
this to be able to objectively
show people that what’s
happening on a longitudinal
basis over the last three years,
across 24 tests,
here is what your hearing
profile has looked like.
And we’re seeing this slight
downtick of that. For me,
that’s the power that Apple
could have in this is to really
motivate people to understand
what’s happening with their own
bodies and then having the
motivation with their own kind,
kind of seeing, okay,
here’s what’s happening
with my data,
here’s what it sounds like to
have these enhancements. Sense.
And to your point,
I kind of think that is that
lift all boats scenario where
people then are saying
to themselves,
I probably should have a
professional go and
check this in.
And because Apple is building
this diagnostic health
ecosystem,
it’s perfectly in keeping for
them to recommend the point
where you get professional
assistance just as they do
for your heart function.
They’re monitoring different
parameters related to your heart
and they will tell you when they
think there’s something wrong
that you should seek
medical attention.
There’s no reason why they
should do that with hearing
either. In other words,
they’re not going to reduce the
sale of AirPods because they
tell you your hearing loss is
out of the bounds of an OTC
device and we recommend you seek
professional assistance.
And so they can be a positive
force there.
And for that reason,
I think that the hearing care
professionals in the driver’s
seat here that building health
features or hearing health
features into AirPods is not
going to be a danger to hearing
care professionals. If anything,
it may send more people
towards them.
Even people who might be within
the bounds of OTC hearing aids
may be encouraged to seek a
professional assessment so they
know exactly where they are and
others may be recommended to do
so based on the hearing test
results that Apple health
delivers to you.
So I think actually it’s a great
spot for hearing care
professionals to be in.
Plus they have other ways to
improve a person’s lifestyle.
Something we’ve talked
about before.
Traditional hearing aids like
the ones I’m wearing,
the music quality is not
very good at all.
Whereas AirPods music quality,
especially if they then start to
EQ the music to account for
your hearing profile,
the music quality will
sound way better.
And so that’s an opportunity for
a hearing care professional
to say, look,
you need these prescription
hearing aids for conversation,
but when you’re listening
to music,
you’re going to enjoy it a lot
more if you use these devices.
So there’s a lot of ways that
Apple’s moves could potentially
intersect with professional
hearing care in a positive way.
Yeah, I mean,
just to go off that point,
if you think about you have kind
of two sets of audio that you’re
consuming on a daily basis.
You have your ambient physical,
real world audio that you’re
just encountering on
a daily basis.
And then you have all this
digital audio that you’re
increasingly consuming more
and more. You know,
I think of one really intriguing
possibility here is that Apple,
by being the hub for your
hearing healthcare profile,
kind of brings to fruition this
hope that has kind of been
on the periphery here.
And I know a couple companies
that are striving to achieve it,
which is to basically create a
hearing profile that can be used
on a variety of your different
apps. Netflix, YouTube, Spotify,
all of the different things that
you’re like using through your
phone, your iPad, your Smart.
TV, whatever.
What if you had the ability to
have this profile in
tandem with that?
That can be the EQing of what
you mentioned there,
where
the mixing of the audio itself
and how it’s being consumed
through your AirPods is as much
being done at the smartphone or
at the iOS level than it is at
just the hardware level.
So I think that, again,
I’m with you in the fact that I
have a hard time imagining Apple
will take it upon themselves to
full blown move into the
hearing aid market,
the prescription hearing aid
market. I could be like,
maybe they have motivations
there that are not being
accounted for.
They want to just get more
broadly into the hearing
healthcare space.
And this is a good way to maybe
cater to just like older
adults in general.
And maybe their interests
are just broader.
Maybe they’re looking at how to
redesign the Apple Genius stores
in their just general footprint.
It’s really hard to predict
these things.
We don’t know what a $3 trillion
company like that has
the capacity to do.
Maybe they just add a healthcare
center to every single one
of their retail stores.
That could be a giant stretch
right now, but in time,
maybe something like that
comes to fruition.
But my point is that I think
that we would be foolish to just
completely dismiss Apple’s role
here. And to your point,
I look at this and say this is
probably going to be
a net positive,
because I think all it does is
it’s going to bring a whole lot
more people into the fold the
further they get into this,
because they’re one of the very
few companies that I think has
the ability to change culture.
And that seems to be actually at
the root of what needs to happen
in order to get more
people here,
is that we as a culture need to
embrace treating your
hearing more.
And I think that it might
require a big brand like them to
kind of reimagine this in a way
that people are willing to think
differently about what it means
to wear a device for those
purposes and trying to combat
the stigma from the consumer
side up. Yeah, absolutely.
We’ve come full circle to the
beginning part of the
conversation that
the true value,
if they move into the hearing
space is going to be changing
people’s attitudes about
hearing loss.
And other companies are at it
too. As you mentioned earlier,
I had Win Cramer,
the CEO of JLab on and talked
about their moves because
they’ve already publicly
announced all their new earbuds
will have a listening safe mode
so you don’t exceed 85 dB
when you’re listening.
They’ve got passive hearing
protection devices and announced
two over to counter
hearing aids,
neither one of which
are out yet,
but will be before the
end of the year.
So we know they’re publicly
getting in the game.
And they also have the ability
to influence consumer behavior.
So you have one company coming.
In for sure.
You have the larger one,
Apple potentially coming in,
certainly sending signals that
they’re going to in one
form or another,
and who else will follow all
these together are going to
change how people think about
addressing their hearing loss.
Yeah,
I couldn’t agree more with that.
So as we kind of come
to the close here,
any closing thoughts in terms
of where you see,
you know,
kind of the rest of this year,
shaking out what’s on your mind
in terms of this OTC space?
And kind of catering to the
mild end of the market.
Just, broadly speaking,
where’s your head at with this
space and some of the things
that you’re anticipating?
Well,
I think it’s worthwhile to talk
about a key difference between
over the counter and
prescription hearing aids is how
people are going to wear them.
Because many of the people who
are in OTC territory feel
they’re fine understanding
people in conversation.
When they’re one on one
in a quiet setting,
they can hear okay,
so they’re looking for
situational help.
And that leaves a big opening
for consumer devices.
And I would say this about Apple
too. Current AirPods Pro,
five 6 hours battery life.
And so to make that leap to
18 hours battery life,
it’s a huge development effort.
And this is where the
traditional hearing aid
companies shine,
because they develop the custom,
asics the custom chips.
Specifically to be able to do
discrete devices that run at
exceptionally low power
so you can go all day.
That’s a breakpoint in the
roadmap that I don’t think Apple
or the others are going to do
when they can do so much good at
the milder end with situational
devices.
So that’s where I think it’s
headed. Jlabs devices,
for example.
They’ll be situational devices,
they won’t be 18 hours devices,
but they don’t need to be.
Listen to the music
on the train,
turn on the ANC while
you’re there,
walk into the crowded
restaurant,
flip it into restaurant mode,
and all the while you’re getting
milder end of hearing correction
to assist you in various
situations. Perfect.
I think that’s where it’s going.
And when these consumer
companies come in,
then I think we’re going to see
completely different
set of messages.
So that’s what in the next, say,
twelve months,
I would say I wouldn’t
necessarily put it before the
end of the calendar year,
but say in the next
twelve months,
when we start to see these
things go to market and the
messaging that goes around it,
then it’s going to be
really exciting.
I’ve already written in my mind
probably ten times the Apple
commercial I would make if I was
responsible for bringing hearing
features and AirPods
Pro to market.
A variation of the current one,
where you see that the hip
person is walking on the street
listening to music.
They opened the door to a crowd.
Restaurant.
A clearly attractive person over
there looks at them and
they touch their ear.
All the noise goes away and
they greet that person.
It all looks very cool
and stylish. Boom.
Game changer right there.
That’s what I’m looking forward
to in the next year.
Yeah, for sure. And that whole,
like,
you make such a good
point because
I think that the answer here
isn’t necessarily to make like
a watered down hearing aid to
solve for these situational
situations.
Like you said,
one of the biggest limitations
that a lot of these DSP based
products are going to run into,
if you are comparing them
apples to apples,
is going to be the battery
power. But to your point,
it might just be that you need
something that’s situational
that you can use these little
pocket chargers, pop them in,
pop them out for those times.
But that kind of begs the
question, I think the noisy,
crowded restaurant is the best
real world scenario to think
through of what would a consumer
actually want to solve for that?
Because you kind of present
another issue which is sure,
if the hearing aid rick form
factor isn’t going to
necessarily be the one that you
want to use for that situational
setting.
Do you need something that looks
like an AirPod and then does
that kind of present
a challenge?
Because people are like,
I don’t want to have something
that draws attention to myself.
And people are like,
what are you doing wearing know
bluetooth headset at? And like,
again, like,
I think that’s where Apple has
the ability to usher in this
whole idea in a big way.
I think that someone’s going to
have to start to kind of plant
that idea in the masses minds of
there is an option that exists
for these noisy situations.
Do we need something that’s sort
of analogous to cheaters?
And it’s like similar
price point.
Could we get those JLab
situational devices for
$50 down the road?
And is it a single application
that’s being used there?
And how does this become
made aware for people?
In the same way that you can
go to a nice restaurant,
you can request cheaters to be
able to look at the menu?
Will we look at a scenario in
the future where that same
restaurant might have some
of these different
cheaters for your ears that are
designed for people that
struggle to hear in the so,
like,
that’s what’s going
through my mind.
A lot of the technology is there
or it’s percolating and
it’s almost there,
but it’s these cultural
challenges that I think are the
big uphill battle and why I’m
actually really excited about
Apple moving further into this
area because I think that from
a cultural standpoint,
apple is going to
be able to make.
Really big impact here
because without that,
I think
you’re still presented with
issues where I don’t know how
these kinds of things
get solved.
For in light of the fact that
the social behavior around it is
a little alien to what we
do right now. Yeah,
and you make a really good point
there because earbuds have a
little bit better off because
even hearing at companies are
starting to make earbud type
wholly in the conscious type
devices. And of course,
new Hero has been added for
a long, long time too.
But AirPods specifically have
been advertised heavily as
consumption devices,
streaming music.
And a lot of people will say,
oh, look,
there’s no stigma about wearing
these devices because people
walk around all the time
with AirPods on,
they walk around all the time
with AirPods on when they are
functionally alone out on the
street where they’re
not interacting.
But there’s still a cultural
barrier to wearing them
in social settings.
But if they go public with the
hearing features and they show
somebody walking into a
restaurant and flipping them
into restaurant mode or using
them as a hearing device,
they will also change the
attitudes of people who aren’t
wearing them. So in other words,
I may not need a hearing device,
but I see Apple advertising
people wearing these in
a restaurant. Well,
when I see people wearing
them in a restaurant,
I will have already gotten the
message that they’re doing it
because they want to
hear me better,
not because they want
to tune me out.
And this is where I think all of
the consumer brands will play
a role when they go public.
Now,
it looks pretty clear to me that
JLab is going to be first in
terms of mass market consumer
brand coming to market
with hearing devices.
So I’m really interested to see
how they bring it to market and
how successful they are.
Their preset device will be $99.
They announced
their self tuning device will
be something higher.
They haven’t publicly
said the price yet.
It’ll be something higher,
but clearly consumer level
pricing maybe $200 or $250.
That’s my guess based on
what they offer today.
So we’re really going to
see how that plays,
how they bring it to market,
and how people’s attitudes
change, how the press covers it.
And that’s going to be an
exciting start to the consumer
entering the hearing space.
And at $99,
you start to think
more globally.
We’ve been talking about
the US with OTC,
but when you talk about
the global situation,
it’s going to take devices at
those low price points,
$99 and down if you really want
to drive into the global
underserved market.
I think the runners have run the
preliminary lapse and now we’re
going to head to the starting
line and the starting gun is
going to go off or we’re really
going to see how well OTC
devices change people’s
minds about hearing.
So a gun hasn’t gone off yet,
but I really look looking
forward to the race when it
does. Yes, I’m with you.
And I do think that
it’s yet to be.
Seen if these will over
the course of time,
we could actually see the whole
notion that these are over the
counter hearing AIDS might kind
of fall by the wayside as they
become more consumer products
with added hearing healthcare
functionality. Again,
it’s semantics.
But I think this stuff really
matters in terms of how it’s
positioned and marketed to the
consumer because I think that
there is such an underlying
level of stigma with
this whole thing.
And I think that what’s most
exciting to me is I kind of am
starting to feel like I’m seeing
things come into focus of maybe
how we ultimately can
combat that stigma,
like broadly speaking.
And I personally feel that it’s
probably going to come from
these big consumer companies
that from the bottom up will
kind of help people to rethink
what these devices can
be intended for.
And all of the value that those
things provide so that people
start to we move to a point
to where we treat hearing
healthcare in the same way
that we do our vision.
Which is to say that nobody
really bats an eye when they see
people wearing eyeglasses.
I kind of think that’s the
goal here. And for me,
I think that there is some
really exciting things to be
thinking about about how
maybe that happens.
Wouldn’t agree with you more.
I think that’s a great way to
close off the conversation.
Just what you said. Fantastic.
Well, Andy,
thanks so much for chatting
with me today.
Thanks for everybody who tuned
in here to the end.
We will chat with you next time.
Cheers. Bye.
Be sure to subscribe to the TWIH YouTube channel for the latest episodes each week and follow This Week in Hearing on LinkedIn and Twitter.
Prefer to listen on the go? Tune into the TWIH Podcast on your favorite podcast streaming service, including Apple, Spotify, Google and more.
About the Panel
Andrew Bellavia is the Founder of AuraFuturity. He has experience in international sales, marketing, product management, and general management. Audio has been both of abiding interest and a market he served professionally in these roles. Andrew has been deeply embedded in the hearables space since the beginning and is recognized as a thought leader in the convergence of hearables and hearing health. He has been a strong advocate for hearing care innovation and accessibility, work made more personal when he faced his own hearing loss and sought treatment All these skills and experiences are brought to bear at AuraFuturity, providing go-to-market, branding, and content services to the dynamic and growing hearables and hearing health spaces.
Dave Kemp is the Director of Business Development & Marketing at Oaktree Products and the Founder & Editor of Future Ear. In 2017, Dave launched his blog, FutureEar.co, where he writes about what’s happening at the intersection of voice technology, wearables and hearing healthcare. In 2019, Dave started the Future Ear Radio podcast, where he and his guests discuss emerging technology pertaining to hearing aids and consumer hearables. He has been published in the Harvard Business Review, co-authored the book, “Voice Technology in Healthcare,” writes frequently for the prominent voice technology website, Voicebot.ai, and has been featured on NPR’s Marketplace.
