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People are our most valuable source of insights

eriksholm about us

Eriksholm Research Centre is part of Oticon, a world leader in hearing care. We share the same philosophy that people are our main source of insights.

 

This is realised through close collaborations with world leading academic research institutions. By bringing experts together, we are able to create mutually-beneficial research synergies and open up new lines of inquiry in the broader research community.

By engaging in continuous dialogue with a large number of people living with hearing loss and the care professionals dedicated to helping them, we are able to maintain a deep understanding of the real-life implications of hearing loss, and gauge the impact of our ideas with real people in their everyday lives.

The result is a team of multi-disciplinary staff able to identify and demonstrate new opportunities within audiology, signal processing and behavioural science. This lays the foundation for Oticon to further develop audiological concepts and apply them in hearing solutions that empower people with hearing loss to communicate freely, interact naturally and participate actively.

As active members of the international scientific community, our results are published regularly.

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Working at Eriksholm 

Eriksholm Research Centre’s team of multi-talented professionals is dedicated to identifying and demonstrating new opportunities within audiology, signal processing and behavioural science.

Here you can read about some of our employees and their key qualifications. 

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The Eriksholm Scientific Advisory Board

Eriksholm Scientific Advisory Board consists of a group of researchers from some of the world’s leading, international research institutions as well as scientific specialists from within the William Demant Group. The members of board meet twice a year to discuss new trends in technology and tangible ideas to inspire the research work at Eriksholm Research Centre.

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    Lise Lotte Bundesen
    Managing Director, Ida Institute
  • John Crawford
    John Crawford
    Healthcare Industry Leader IBM, and IBM Industry Academy Member
  • Torsten DauTHUMB
    Torsten Dau
    Professor, Head of Hearing Systems Centre for Applied Hearing Research, Technical University of Denmark.
  • Fredrik GustafssonTHUMB
    Frederik Gustafsson
    Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
  • Sophia KramerTHUMB
    Sophia Kramer
    Professor, Department of Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery, VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, Netherlands
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    Olivier Macherey
    Research Manager at The French National Centre for Scientific Research, Paris
  • SalomoTHUMB
    Søren Salomo
    Professor, Head of Department at DTU Management Engineering, Technical University of Denmark
  • Shankar SastryTHUMB
    Shankar Sastry
    Professor, Dean at College of Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, USA.
  • Barbara Shinn-CunninghamTHUMB
    Barbara Shinn-Cunningham
    Professor, Director at Center for Computational Neuroscience and Neural Technology, Boston University, Boston, USA
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    Tuomas Virtanen
    Professor, Tampere University of Technology.
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The Eriksholm Collection

 

The Eriksholm Collection charts the history of hearing aids and hosts a unique collection of mechanical, electrical and electronic instruments.

Two-centuries worth of mechanical devices

As one of the most complete collections in the world, the Eriksholm Collection provides an impressive overview of the advances in hearing-aid technology over the last century. In addition to more than 800 historic hearing aids, the collection also contains about 50 different brands of mechanical devices from the US and Europe, dating from 1800 to 1950.

Much more than hearing aids

The Eriksholm collection comprises a great deal of historic documentation. This includes

  • Technical reports and sketches of mechanical designs
  • Descriptions of development processes and technical specifications
  • Sales promotion materials (consumer brochures, product brochures, instructions for use)
  • Photos and audiological fitting guides
  • Original audio/video tapes, plus DVDs and CD-ROMs containing product information 

The Oticon Business Archive

The third part of the collection - the Oticon Business Archive - contains documentation from the company’s early years, e.g. ledgers from 1904-1940; business letters from 1920-1950; memos and business plans from the 1950s, and guest books. This archive also contains historic photographs of Oticon locations from all over the world.

Contact us

If you have any antique hearing aids, historical documentation, pictures of hearing aids or people wearing them - or any piece of Oticon-related historical information - we would be delighted to hear from you.

Please write to

Eriksholm Research Centre
Att.: Claus Nielsen
Rørtangvej 20
DK – 3070 Snekkersten

If you have questions

As a special service, we provide answers to questions regarding antique hearing aids (all brands) and the history of Oticon. Please send your questions via email to history@eriksholm.com.

Did you know this?

Hearing aids from the 1920s often still work! Their components haven’t deteriorated as much as newer hearing aids containing rubber and foam rubber, that stiffen or crumble with time.

Or this?

What did hearing aids cost in 1910, 1920, 1930 and 1940? An extrapolation of the old prices into current prices yields the following results (in USD): $5000, $2700, $1600 and $3250 respectively.