>> Israeli Startup's Seeing Aid for the Blind Sees Big Demand
>> By Gwen Ackerman - July 2, 2013
>> Amnon Shashua had a vision of using technology to help the visually
>> impaired. His startup OrCam is quickly making a global impact.
>> OrCam makes a small gizmo that hooks onto a pair of glasses and tells
>> the wearer what's in front of him. It can read the text of a book aloud,
>> or announce
>>
>> the names of friends and family in a room.
>> The Israeli company began taking orders for the $2,500 seeing-aid device
>> on June 4, and within a few weeks, the first run of 600 units were sold
>> out, Shashua,
>>
>> the co-founder and chief executive officer, said in an interview. Since
>> then, the company's backlog of orders has ballooned to more than 1,000.
>>
>> OrCam has been manufacturing the product in Israel. To keep up with
>> demand, Shashua said the startup plans to relocate production to China.
>> He has experience
>>
>> there. His other company, Mobileye, uses Chinese manufacturing for its
>> products designed to help prevent auto collisions.
>>
>> Liat Negrin, 37, has been testing early prototypes at OrCam. She was
>> born visually impaired, and said the device can help her and others
>> accomplish everyday
>>
>> tasks like going shopping without fear of getting lost or buying the
>> wrong items.
>> "It helps you be independent and helps overcome fears," Negrin said in
>> an interview. "It helps you keep your orientation, and you always know
>> where you
>>
>> are."
>>
>> The OrCam consists of a camera and earpiece that attaches to eyeglasses.
>> Live video from the camera feeds into a smartphone-size device in the
>> user's pocket,
>>
>> which processes the data and sends an audio snippet saying what it sees
>> to the bone-conduction speaker in the user's ear. Because the video feed
>> is processed
>>
>> in the pocket instead of in the cloud like many mobile apps do, response
>> times are quicker, Shashua said. Also, users won't be left stranded when
>> in areas
>>
>> that have poor mobile-data service.
>>
>> "Imagine there is a helper standing next to you, seeing what you are
>> supposed to see, figuring out what visual information you want and
>> whispering into
>>
>> your ear what you are about to see," he said.
>> Shashua, who is also a professor of computer science at the Hebrew
>> University of Jerusalem, spent about three years developing OrCam's
>> technology. The
>>
>> current version of the tool only supports English, but the 20-person
>> team is working on incorporating other European languages. OrCam can
>> recognize a wide
>>
>> array of objects including street signs, newspaper articles, money and
>> products on supermarket shelves. The device can also be trained to
>> identify faces.
>>
>> It costs about the same as a mid-range hearing aid, and has the
>> potential to be just as essential to people who need it.
>>
>> "As the world population ages, we will see an increase in the visually
>> impaired," said Cheri Wiggs, a director at the U.S. National Institutes
>> of Health.
>>
>> "At this point, we aren't preventing or curing blindness so any new
>> development in assistive devices for visually impaired is very
>> important."
>> Wiggs estimated that about 300 million people suffer from visual
>> impairment worldwide, with India having the largest percentage. Shashua
>> estimates 50 million
>>
>> of the visually impaired may be able to afford the OrCam device.
>> The factories in China better get moving.
>>
>> Source URL:
>> http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-02/israeli-startup-s-seeing-aid-for-the-blind-sees-big-demand.html


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