SoundFocus, a San Francisco, CA-based startup building the next generation of hearing technology, raised $1.7m in seed funding.
Backers included Kapor Capital, Y Combinator (the company graduated in the Summer 2013 batch), Greg Badros, VegasTechFund, OVO Fund, RTA Capital, Garry Tan, Alexis Ohanian and Harj Taggar.
Founded by CEO Alex Selig (who grew up with hearing loss) and Varun Srinivasan in September of 2012, SoundFocus provides an app for iOS that personalizes music by tuning the audio to unique hearing pattern. It takes a hearing test that captures how well users hear particular frequencies of sound and then uses that data to tune the music playback accordingly. SoundFocus’ software employs signal processing algorithms to rebalance audio to match listening needs compensating for specific frequencies that users have trouble hearing clearly.
The company’s team is now working on a hardware device that will handle both phone’s music library and everyday situations, like making phone calls or watching TV.
FinSMEs
21/02/2014