FRAMINGHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--International Data Corporation (IDC) has published a new IDC Innovators report profiling three companies that have taken a traditional audio-centric hearable device and augmented it with new features and functionalities. The three companies are Bragi, Nuheara, and Waverly Labs.
Wearable devices have seen strong adoption among consumers over the past five years through fitness trackers and smartwatches. More recently, the introduction of new business and enterprise applications have started to bring these devices into the workplace. The same trend can be seen within a fast-growing segment of the smart earwear market, also known as hearables, where new capabilities are being added to the devices that expand the ways in which people communicate.
Hearable devices include any wearable computing device that hangs on or plugs into the ear. The device must operate wirelessly and provide stereo sound while also being capable of gathering and processing digital information. Earwear must also offer at least one of the following features: track health and fitness; modify audio (beyond noise reduction); provide language translation on the device; and enable smart assistants at the touch of a button or through keyword detection, even if the assistant is running on another device.
"Hearables are quickly becoming the hot product within the wearables market, and while many focus on streaming audio and making phone calls, these companies help their wearers with personal and/or professional productivity," said Ramon T. Llamas, research director with IDC's Mobile Devices team. "Two of these companies recognize and help solve the challenges that some people have simply to communicate, and the third adds new AI-based functionalities to other companies' hearable devices. The end result: wearers who communicate more easily and devices with extended usage and life cycles."
The report, IDC Innovators: Enabling Hearables That Function Beyond Audio, 2019 (IDC #US45635419), profiles three emerging vendors that have developed new or expanded capabilities for hearable devices.
- Bragi helps its customers to develop smart audio products by enabling hearables to execute computing and data analysis on the device instead of the cloud using the smallest amount of power and memory.
- Nuheara is a hearing healthcare company that has developed situational-use hearable devices that augment a wearer's hearing in real time with amplification, noise reduction, and audio beamforming.
- Waverly Labs offers a hearable device that translates 20 languages in close to real time and expands the experience from understanding someone speaking in a foreign language to a two-way conversation.
About IDC Innovators
IDC Innovators reports present a set of vendors – under $100 million in revenue at time of selection – chosen by an IDC analyst within a specific market that offer an innovative new technology, a groundbreaking approach to an existing issue, and/or an interesting new business model. It is not an exhaustive evaluation of all companies in a segment or a comparative ranking of the companies. Vendors in the process of being acquired by a larger company may be included in the report provided the acquisition is not finalized at the time of publication of the report. Vendors funded by venture capital firms may also be included in the report even if the venture capital firm has a financial stake in the vendor's company. IDC INNOVATOR and IDC INNOVATORS are trademarks of International Data Group, Inc.
For more information about IDC Innovators research, please contact Karen Moser at kmoser@idc.com.
About IDC
International Data Corporation (IDC) is the premier global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets. With more than 1,100 analysts worldwide, IDC offers global, regional, and local expertise on technology and industry opportunities and trends in over 110 countries. IDC's analysis and insight helps IT professionals, business executives, and the investment community to make fact-based technology decisions and to achieve their key business objectives. Founded in 1964, IDC is a wholly-owned subsidiary of International Data Group (IDG), the world's leading tech media, data and marketing services company. To learn more about IDC, please visit www.idc.com. Follow IDC on Twitter at @IDC and LinkedIn. Subscribe to the IDC Blog for industry news and insights: http://bit.ly/IDCBlog_Subscribe.
