Wednesday, February 26, 2003

Adapto wins award

Oticon's Adapto, the first voice-activated hearing instrument, has been selected as a winner of the 2002 European Information Society Technology Prize, among the world's most distinguished awards for groundbreaking information technologies. Adapto was honored for its technical excellence and innovative content, as well as for its potential market value and resulting capacity to generate new jobs.

"We are honored to have this innovative hearing instrument recognized by so prestigious an organization as the European Information Society," stated Mikael Worning, president of Oticon Inc., Somerset, NJ. "We are especially pleased that Adapto is seen as an instrument that facilitates the sharing of information. We know that Adapto's ability to enhance users' ability to communicate with family, friends and colleagues has been key to its success in the marketplace."

Adapto is the first fully digital hearing instrument that automatically detects and prioritizes human voice over other sounds in the environment. The new instrument's VoiceFinder technology immediately detects human voice sounds and processes them for better understanding. If no speech is detected, Adapto automatically switches to a "comfort mode," tuning out noise and irrelevant sounds to protect users from the fatigue that constant unfiltered sounds can inflict on people who wear hearing instruments.