A Brainy Headset for Clearer Sound Alex Asseily and Hosain Rahman ignored the naysayers and started Aliph to market a cell-phone add-on that's opening ears By Alex Salkever, Technology editor for BusinessWeek Online In the late 1990s, starting a new Internet company with a healthy bucket of venture capital seemed de rigeur for engineering undergraduates at Stanford University. Well, most of them. While many of their classmates were out conquering the Internet, Alex Asseily and Hosain Rahman were trying to build the perfect mobile-phone headset. Their friends, needless to say, were unimpressed. "Some of them were selling companies for hundreds of millions of dollars," Asseily says. "They said to us, 'Don't mobile phones already work? I mean, you talk and people hear you, right?'" Give the contrarians their due: Asseily and Rahman saw a market few did and weren't fooled by the dot-com carnival. They believed that early mobile tech successes like the first Palm (PLMO) personal digital assistant and Nokia (NOK) cell phones with big screens and loads of features could lead to something more than just a cool gadget. So in 1999, they started a company called Aliph and set out on their mobile adventure. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6306327/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CARLSBAD, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 8, 2004--A revolutionary new headset for mobile phones, designed to perform at a radically higher level, was demonstrated here publicly for the first time today before technology industry and business leaders attending the Wall Street Journal's prestigious "D: All Things Digital Conference" at the Four Seasons Avaria. The new headset, called Jawbone, from Brisbane, CA -- based Aliph, enables mobile users to overcome the challenges of a noisy environment: to hear and be heard more clearly. Jawbone combines advanced technology with breakthrough product design to deliver greater performance, comfort and style for an exceptional user experience that far exceeds anything on the market today. The product was selected as one of the few new products and technologies by Wall Street Journal columnists and conference co-hosts Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher to be demonstrated at the D Conference. Today's technology demonstration was a sneak preview of the product, which Aliph plans to formally debut and begin shipping in the Fall of 2004. ... Six years in the making, Jawbone incorporates military-grade audio product development research which Aliph has conducted for DARPA since 2002. Designed with battlefield performance quality in mind, Jawbone's sound processing technology was developed with built-in intelligence to perfectly detect speech and to rapidly understand changes in the noise environment. This allows crystal clear voice quality no matter what occurs in their noise environment. Additional details about Jawbone's proprietary technology will be revealed when the product is released in Fall 2004. ... http://mobile-electronics.net/aliph/aliph_jawbone_headset/
Aliph ships their cool looking Jawbone mobile phone headset. Apperently the technology behind the Jawbone is based on breakthrough military-grade technology, the Jawbone adjusts and optimizes both incoming and outgoing sound to achieve exceptional clarity in any environment in a manner previously not achievable. Inside Jawbone, an intelligent system of sensors and software adaptively enhances the audio signals using a three-stage process: first, a voice activity sensor detects the vibrations produced on the cheeks by speech. Meanwhile, two microphones capture and then subtract unwanted and disturbing background noises. Finally, Jawbone dynamically enhances the incoming audio, allowing it to stand out clearly above the clamor of your background. The Jawbone sells for $149.95 on the Jawbone site. Most Motorola, Nokia and Sony Ericsson Phones are compatible.
