Phonak today expanded its array of products based on its new Spice sound processing platform with the entry-level and mid-range Cassia and Solana hearing aids as well as the new Phonak CROS solution addressing the problem of single-sided deafness.
Phonak’s Spice Generation platform, introduced last Fall, provides a much smaller, faster processor along with numerous wireless features to provide state-of-the-art features in the company’s new hearing aids, loading them with features usually found only in premium hearing hearing aids. And by utilizing the Spice chipset for the Phonak CROS solution, the company is able to provide a feature-rich, flexible set of solutions for people with one completely deaf ear.
- The entry-level Cassia hearing aid is loaded with features found on few other entry-level hearing aids, including Phonak’s SoundRecover, UltraZoom, WhistleBlock and SoundFlow features to reduce feedback and distortion and provide better intelligibility of speech in noise.
- The mid-range Solana hearing aid offers those and additional features, including binaural functionality (wireless communication balancing interaction between left and right hearing aid, enabling users to locate and understand speech), enhanced directional microphones, and full wireless access to audio from television, MP3 players and telephones streamed from Phonak’s wireless RF transmitters.
- The Phonak CROS and biCROSS systems are for people who are totally deaf in one ear and either have normal hearing or who need a hearing aid in the other ear. One unit with a microphone and a transmitter sits in the deaf ear and communicates sound entering that ear wirelessly to a hearing aid sitting in the other ear. Because the CROS and biCROS microphone and transmitter are compatible with the entire family of Spice Generation hearing aids, Phonak can claim to provide the broadest and most flexible set of solutions for people suffering from single-sided deafness.
Because the Spice platform packs so much power into such a small chipset, the new hearing aids are smaller and more cosmetically attractive than the company’s previous hearing aids, even as they deliver more features and performance.