Oticon celebrates in Spain: "A million Opn hearing aids sold"

He also told them how the latest tests on this model showed how OpenSound Navigator, Opn’s stand-out feature, allows people to “participate actively in the most demanding surroundings; whatever their hearing environment, they will experience a major improvement.” As an example, he guaranteed that speech discrimination in a restaurant will improve by 20% to 75%.

The CEO of the Danish producer did not pass up the opportunity to share the latest evidence showing how Opn, “Oticon’s most advanced hearing aid, helps people with hearing loss to improve speech intelligibility and management of multiple speakers.” Presenting this information to Spanish audiologists working with this technology, Nielsen backed up his words with the results of studies that compare OpenSound Navigator with the functioning of the other brand hearing aids based on traditional or narrow directionality. A real conversation between four persons in noisy surroundings was used to put these different devices to the test. In this exercise, “Oticon Opn significantly bettered discrimination for the central speaker, in comparison with traditional directionality, and equalling results using narrow directionality. And this was achieved keeping input open to all relevant sounds in the environment,” points out Oticon. The firm also claims that Opn betters both other types of direccionality in conversations with speakers located to the listener’s sides, with speech discrimination actually rising 15%.

The results also reveal how this model “reduces both listening effort and the burden on the brain across a wide range of sound environments, thus letting users unwind and enjoy situations that were previously too demanding.” Finally, the firm highlighted the statistic that 96% of users asked said they heard better with Oticon Opn, and that 81% say they understood more with less effort.

Jorge Valdano

The meeting that brought the William Demant Group CEO to Spain did not only serve to get across product. Nielsen, the hearing professionals working with Oticon technology, and the firm’s managers and technicians in Spain, also enjoyed the presence of the ex-footballer and manager Jorge Valdano, who gave a talk highlighting the “11 strengths of a leader”, sharing his experiences of success and all kinds of advice on setting more difficult goals and meeting them through an attitude of leadership.

To cap the evening, the gathering was treated to a trip to the Madrid-based Royal Tapestry Factory, a gesture of gratitude from Oticon to its customers for “work well done”, and one carrying a clear message: “Together, what we are weaving is helping many people to improve their quality of life.” The message holds firm to the company’s essential motto: “People first.”