Smart ear-worn devices may become a strong competitor to smart watches

Smartwatches and fitness bands have taken the lead in the competition with smart earphones and wearables, the latter targeting fitness enthusiasts (or future fitness enthusiasts), while the former is a surprisingly useful supplement (or even replacement) for smartphones. As a supplement to the phone, this mini device only needs a voice interface. The days of flicking the dial with your finger are a thing of the past. These wearables are getting smarter and smarter ("OK Google"). However, once they become truly smart, you start to wonder whether you really need a dial or a screen. In this case, do wearables have to be presented in the form of watches?

The replacement has to be something we are comfortable using, so smart earphones, headphones and even hearing aids will become strong competitors to watches. For many years, we thought these devices were just accessories for smartphones (and that excluded hearing aids). However, you can see that technology is constantly evolving. Wireless headphones and in-ear headphones are starting to appear. These devices no longer require a connection wire, and although they seem more convenient, they are still just accessories to the main product.

But then something new happened. Apple added Siri support to AirPods 2. Now you can ask Siri (through your AirPods) to call someone in your contact list, or start a playlist, turn up the volume, or give you directions to the nearest Starbucks. Even though your phone is sitting in your pocket, it's doing a lot of work behind the scenes. The AirPods will manage voice pickup, beamforming, noise filtering, and most importantly, recognizing your voice. You can make and receive calls and switch songs with your hands full of groceries.

What about health-related applications? Do you no longer need a wristband to monitor your health/heart condition? Yes. Wireless earbuds are now able to monitor heart rate, body temperature, breathing and activity. In fact, it makes more sense to monitor these factors inside the ear rather than on the wrist (your doctor certainly thinks so).

At this year’s CES, ReSound introduced their LiNX Quattro, an AI-enabled smart hearing aid that pairs with an Android or iOS app, allowing the wearer to control the device with voice commands, like turning up the volume in one ear or adjusting the filter based on ambient noise. If you know someone who wears hearing aids, you know these aren’t “nice to have” features, they allow the wearer to hear clearly, especially when there’s a lot of people talking.

This isn’t just limited to in-ear headphones. Also at CES this year, Jabra announced AI-powered noise-canceling headphones. They claim their Elite headphones can detect over 6,000 different sound types, like a train pulling into a station, and tune out the noise. If they’ve really nailed it, we’re a big step closer to true noise cancellation, and this product is sure to be a hit.

Another example application is detecting head movements to support 3D sound effects for 3D music experiences or games. As you move or walk, the sound you hear changes depending on the scene you are in, creating a more realistic VR experience. If you are playing a game, when you turn your head, not only will you see the scene change, but the sound you hear will also change.

So what makes all this possible? Obviously, the computing and communication capabilities of ear/headphones must be greatly improved, and the communication must be truly wireless. If you can't get rid of traditional connection wires, then all this will be meaningless. You need to at least establish a Bluetooth connection with the phone and present excellent sound quality in the headphones. Both functions require the help of DSP.

For voice detection, you need at least beamforming, echo cancellation, and noise filtering, which are all DSP functions. Now, you want to add AI inference functions for voice recognition (I don’t want my headset to listen to other people’s voice commands) and command recognition. Again, DSP is considered the best technology for this type of application.

All of this must run at extremely low power: we’re aiming for 12 hours between charges (Apple claims five hours for AirPods 2). In these use cases, the best way to achieve low power is to cluster functionality into as few cores as possible, using only cores that are inherently designed for low-power operation. There’s a reason DSPs are widely used in communications and edge AI — they’re more energy efficient than many other solutions.

The final point I want to make is that wireless headphones get rid of the connection wire, but you still need a phone at hand - like a virtual tether. Or is there another way? Why not let your headphones connect directly to the cellular network? Someone is already developing such products. So the last major advantage that watches have over headphones will no longer exist. Then, the competition for headphone devices will become very interesting.

Click here to learn more about the CEVA-BX ultra-low power sound DSPs designed for full-featured true wireless hearables.