When it comes to hearing aids, innovation has largely focused on what’s inside the device rather than the form it takes. Legato Audio, an AgeTech Collaborative™ startup participant, is challenging that status quo with hearing technology built into something many people already wear every day — a pair of glasses. Using AI-powered speech processing and open-ear audio, the company is creating a discreet, and private, alternative to traditional hearing aids for people with age-related hearing loss.
We spoke with Steve Romine, Legato’s President and Co-Founder, who explained the company’s groundbreaking tech, why hearing aid adoption rates remain stubbornly low and the benefits of treating hearing loss beyond simply being able to hear better.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Legato Audio is taking a very different approach to a technology that has changed surprisingly little in decades. What did you see as the biggest opportunity to rethink how people experience hearing assistance?
We’re on a mission to provide a comfortable, stigma-free alternative to traditional hearing aids for people with age-related hearing loss. The typical behind-the-ear hearing aid was developed in the 1950s. Since then, companies have dumped billions of dollars into improving the technology to make them smaller and to increase their performance. Yet the basic form factor hasn’t changed in 70 years, and many people don’t want to wear them: 80% of people with recognized hearing loss refuse to adopt hearing aids. We believe we can deliver effective hearing performance in an open-ear form factor that’s embedded discreetly in a pair of great-looking glasses.
Why is the form factor itself such a significant obstacle to adoption?
The stigma or embarrassment of wearing a hearing aid is likely the most common reason. Comfort is another one: With a behind-the-ear hearing aid, you have to wear something that’s jammed into your ear for 12 to 14 hours a day. Your ear is a sensitive place, and it’s uncomfortable to wear something stuck in your ear canal for long periods of time.
Cost is a third reason. The average price of prescription hearing aids is about $5,000 a pair. Over-the-counter hearing aids are less expensive, but that hasn’t moved the needle on adoption rates. Even in Europe, where healthcare systems often heavily subsidize the cost of hearing aids, adoption rates are still only about 50%. That reveals that while cost can be a barrier, stigma and discomfort are the primary reasons keeping people on the sidelines.
Your “hearing aid glasses” really do look like an everyday pair of eyeglasses — anyone would be hard pressed to notice they’re actually a device to assist hearing, not eyesight. How do they work?
There are a pair of microphones on each temple arm of the glasses that pick up sound from the direction the person is looking; we bring in a pretty wide field of sound. We then run the sound through an AI-based neural network that we call the Legato SpeechSense AI, which is entirely onboard the system. The Legato SpeechSense AI has been trained to recognize what is speech and what is not speech from the microphone signals, and it provides a clean speech signal. We then apply some processing that amplifies certain frequencies over others, because when you have hearing loss, not all frequencies are compromised evenly. Then, we render the amplified sound through an open-ear audio system that plays privately to the user.
And they work as normal eyeglasses, too. You can put in any kind of lenses that you want — prescription or sunglass lenses, for example.
So the hearing aid processes all take place within the frames themselves?
Everything happens locally on the device. It’s not like some AI tools where information gets sent off to servers for processing and then returns to the device. That means our device is completely private. There are no cameras, and no ability for us to record audio. That distinguishes us from some other smart eyewear devices on the market, which people might perceive as creepy because they can record audio and they have cameras that can take pictures.
How does the performance stack up compared to more traditional hearing solutions?
We had our glasses independently tested by HearAdvisor, an audio testing laboratory. According to their benchmarks, we are performing at a level that is on par with traditional prescription-grade hearing aids, which we are very excited about — especially because our solution is much less expensive than typical behind-the-ear hearing aids.
There’s one caveat to this: HearAdvisor’s model is taking into account the typical or “average” hearing loss that most people will have, for which they might get fitted for hearing aids. But people may have more severe hearing loss that requires an in-ear device or even a cochlear implant.
The benefits of treating hearing loss extend further than many people realize. The Lancet produced a report in 2024 that looked at all the different potential modifiable risk factors for dementia, and the No. 1 item on their list was hearing loss — ranking it higher than depression, hypertension, excessive alcohol consumption and other factors. So treating hearing loss could be a potentially significant factor in reducing a person’s risk of developing dementia.
What was the journey to founding Legato Audio?
My co-founder, Mehul Trivedi, and I were both executives at Bose, where I helped launch the first direct-to-consumer hearing aid in the U.S. in 2019. At the same time, Mehul was running the wearables side of the business, including Bose’s headphones and in-ear headphones. Back in 2020 or so, our teams started exploring the possibility of making hearing glasses. We even built a prototype, but the technology wasn’t ready — it just didn’t perform well enough to provide meaningful hearing performance.
Fast forward a few years. Mehul and I had both moved on from Bose, and we discovered new tech like neural network chips and de-noisers that didn’t exist back in 2020. That’s when we saw a pathway to leverage this new technology to deliver real hearing performance in an open-ear form factor, and we started the company in 2024.
Looking ahead, what would you most like to change about the experience of living with hearing loss?
We really want to change how people treat their hearing loss, especially the 80% of people with recognized hearing loss who refuse to adopt current solutions. This is more important than ever with mounting clinical evidence showing that treating hearing loss matters more than people probably realize. Our glasses make it much easier for people to treat their hearing loss without the barriers that so often prevent people from actually using hearing aids.
Curious about a different approach to hearing assistance? Learn more about Legato Audio and its AI-powered hearing glasses at the company’s website.
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