Tactile watch: ML based device

Honnavar Techsolutions LLP

Tactile watch: ML based device

A sound awareness device that helps people with profound hearing loss past the age by which cochlear impalnts dont work

Honnavar, Karnataka, India

India

For-profit, including B-Corp or similar models

We are addressing the critical gap in sound awareness for people with profound hearing loss who have missed the window for cochlear implants. Globally, over 430 million people live with disabling hearing loss (WHO), projected to rise to 700 million by 2050. Many—especially in low-resource settings—are diagnosed too late for cochlear implants to be effective, leaving them without viable or affordable solutions. In India, over 63 million people have hearing loss, with 1 to 5 million experiencing severe-to-profound loss. In Karnataka alone, 10–30 lakh individuals are affected. Children diagnosed after age six often cannot benefit from cochlear implants due to reduced neural plasticity. Even for eligible children, cochlear implants are prohibitively expensive—costing ₹7–12 lakhs ($8,000–$15,000) including surgery, the device, and post-implant therapy. Most existing solutions are either invasive, expensive, or ineffective for total hearing loss. Low-cost hearing aids don’t help those with no residual hearing. Our solution—an affordable, non-invasive tactile wearable—provides real-time sound awareness through touch. It enables users to perceive critical environmental cues like alarms and traffic. Designed for underserved communities in Bharat and globally, it enhances safety, confidence, and inclusion through improved sound awareness.

We are developing a wrist-worn assistive device for individuals with profound hearing loss, designed to create sound awareness through touch and visuals. The device detects important environmental sounds—like door knocks, vehicle horns, alarms—and converts them into unique vibration patterns and visual cues, allowing users to understand their surroundings without relying on hearing. At the heart of our solution is a microphone, a microcontroller with an embedded machine learning model, a vibration motor, and an optional visual indicator. The ML model recognizes selected sound categories in real time and maps them to corresponding tactile and visual feedback. This enhances not only general sound awareness but also provides specific, customizable alerts for the user’s needs. We plan to keep the model and sound categories open source, enabling community engagement and contribution. With support from users, volunteers, and developers, we will expand the list of detectable sounds, including region-specific languages and sounds. Our solution is affordable, non-invasive, and intended for both general safety and personalized communication, especially for those in underserved and rural communities. A demo video is available here: [https://youtu.be/app-6uNgbL8?si=-P54j8kCmcdJ7Sqr]

Our solution serves individuals with profound hearing loss, especially children and young adults in underserved areas. Many miss the critical age window (under 6 years) for speech development due to delayed diagnosis or the high cost of interventions. Cochlear implants, while effective, are surgically intensive and often unaffordable—costing ₹7–12 lakhs ($8,000–$15,000) including surgery, therapy, and the device—making them inaccessible to many. These individuals often struggle with sound awareness, limiting their safety, independence, and inclusion. Our non-invasive wearable device bridges this gap by providing both generic sound awareness (e.g., knocks, alarms, vehicles) and customizable specific sound recognition (e.g., user-defined words or cues). It uses onboard microphones, embedded firmware, and real-time vibration plus visual cues to inform the user. We also engage the community—parents, educators, NGOs, and users—to co-develop and crowdsource new sound categories. This open-source approach allows continuous expansion, localization, and relevance of the device for different environments and languages. Our solution directly empowers the hearing-disabled with enhanced safety, independence, and social interaction—while remaining affordable and adaptable to their everyday needs.