HearUSA, a business in the WS Audiology Group (WSA), announced a new HearUSA brand, “Sound of the New Age.” The new brand unites 1,000 team members, 360 hearing centers, and 28 brands to introduce hearing care professionals (HCPs) and the 48-million people living with hearing loss to the “Sound of the New Age” of hearing possibilities, according to the company's announcement.
Frank Ring—a well known hearing industry executive, former president of Audivox, and founder of Futuretone, as well as a friend and mentor to many in the field— passed away on May 7 at age 89.
One of the biggest trends over the past year, noted by a large majority of survey respondents, was the number of rechargeable hearing aids dispensed in 2019 vs. the prior year, HHTM reports.
Commentary on the recent purchase of BlameySaunders Hears by Sonova and the future potential for the “blended service model” in hearing aid dispensing.
Read More
One of the most striking responses from the survey revealed that over half of all respondents said they believed hearing aids are not affordable and accessible for most Americans today.
Read More
AuDConnex announced the addition of Paul Harkness to their team as executive vice president. Harkness has more than two decades of experience in the hearing care industry.
Read More
William Demant—parent group of Oticon, Sonic, and Bernafon—has announced a licensing agreement with Philips to bring Philips-branded solutions to hearing healthcare. Combining William Demant’s hearing aid technology with Philips’ global brand presence in healthcare, the cooperation will enrich the hearing healthcare experience and support the healthy lifestyle and active life of even more people with hearing loss, say the companies.
Read More
Amplifon SpA has announced its intent to purchase the privately owned GAES Group, Spain’s largest hearing aid distributor, for €528 million (US$616.6 million). “This major acquisition represents a key milestone in the history of our company and perfectly fits Amplifon’s growth strategy, allowing us to consolidate our global leadership and enabling us to become a market leader in Spain, as well as consolidate our market position in Portugal while also entering the Latin American region,” said Amplifon CEO Enrico Vita.
Read More
Two well-known names and company owners in hearing device manufacturing are joining forces. Etymotic Research Founder Mead Killion announced that his company has merged with Lucid Hearing/Lucid Audio, a prominent hearing aid and PSAP manufacturer owned by Henry Smith, founder of Authorized Hearing Systems (AHS), America Hears, and more recently Liberty Hearing Aids and Lucid Audio.
Read More
Hearing aid pricing trends relative to practice affiliation and gross revenues.
Read More
While Costco’s Christian Anthis likes the article, he takes exception to the characterization of the devices being offered at Costco as “entry-level hearing aids.”
Read More
Called Walgreens Hearing, the new outlets are unique to the marketplace because they are designed to create new business opportunities for existing dispensing offices to partner with Starkey and serve patients at Walgreens stores in their communities. Walgreens Hearing currently exist in two pilot stores that opened last month in the Minneapolis-St Paul market, with about six others opening in three other states, some by mid-April.
Read More
IntriCon has taken another major step forward in its hearing aid and hearables offerings—this time adding audio streaming functionality. IntriCon’s and NXP’s R&D teams merged hearing aid engineering and wireless audio streaming semiconductor technology to deliver hearing aid devices that can stream wireless audio from IntriCon’s wireless accessories. It intends to launch this technology—coupled with a remote microphone—into its Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) and Direct-to-Insurance (DTI) channels in the first half of 2018.
Read More
The Elite Hearing Network, a network of more than 1600 hearing care offices across the United States, has announced its new Member Advisory Board. The board consults with executive leadership on business trends, legislative agendas, services, and solutions to the hearing health industry.
Read More
Two well-known hearing aid group purchasing networks, AuDNet Inc and Marcon Hearing Group, have announced their merger into the newly formed AUDNET Hearing Group (AHG).
Read More
CVS Pharmacy has added audiologist-staffed hearing centers within seven of its store locations in the Baltimore-Washington, DC area, and plans to expand to a total of 50 locations by the end of 2017, according to an article in Drug Store News.
Read More
Big changes are happening in hearing healthcare and EarQ is at the forefront. In addition to redefining its next-level solutions for independent practices, the company has brought on industry-experts, Ron Gleitman, PhD, as vice president of sales and practice development and Catherine Richardson, MA, as outside national sales director.
Read More
GN Store Nord announced in its fiscal 2016 results that the company experienced a revenue increase of 12% to $1.24 billion (DKK 8,651 million), with 6% of that being organic growth. GN Hearing reports that it gained market share in 2016 for the 6th consecutive year, underlining the company’s continuing strong momentum.
Read More