Syntiant Corp., the semiconductor and software firm that first gained attention for its chips that power Amazon’s virtual assistant Alexa, is making its latest push into AI-powered audio with the acquisitions of AudioSourceRE and Oro-sound.
On June 15, the Irvine-based company announced the acquisition of two firms specializing in sound-processing technologies. One enables listeners and audio professionals to separate vocals from instruments in recordings, while the other filters out background noise in wearable devices such as earbuds, headsets and smart glasses.
“We are certainly in the AI race,” Syntiant co-founder and CEO Kurt Busch told the Business Journal.
The chief executive, who previously said he intends to take the company public, declined to disclose the purchase price for the two acquisitions.
He did note that the deals were financed through a combination of stock and cash.
Syntiant picked up about 20 employees with the purchases, bringing the companywide headcount to 1,490 as of June.
Syntiant also announced the addition of two new independent board members: Adam Spice, chief financial officer of Long Beach-based Rocket Lab Corp., and David Lam, chief investment officer of Lam Frontier Technologies (see story this page).
Sound Processing Technologies
“As AI moves into wearables, hearables, smart glasses and other edge devices, the ability to interpret dynamic audio environments without cloud connectivity becomes increasingly important,” according to Busch.
Busch said Syntiant has already been working with the newly acquired companies for more than a year.
“We had met them through customer engagements,” he said.
One of the two companies recently acquired, AudioSourceRE, is based in Cork City, Ireland and specializes in what is called sound separation.
“You can take the vocals out of music or put the vocals back in,” Busch said.
So, if you like the Beatles instrumentation but not the singing of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, you can get just an instrumentation soundtrack for karaoke, for example.
“You also could use it in your home theater if for example the background special effects were so noisy you couldn’t hear the dialogue. You can use the AI-based sound separation to be able to listen to the dialogue,” Busch said.
The sound can also be enhanced and “professional audio creation” is also one of the features.
The other company, Orosound of Paris, removes unwanted background noises with enhancement technologies.
Orosound’s systems are deployed across Europe, Asia and North America and are designed for emerging uses including open-fit earbuds, smart glasses and other wearable devices.
Busch says Orosound provides “all of the software that we need to completely build turnkey earbud design.”
Earth-Bound to Satellites
Syntiant, founded in 2017, provides chips that power always-on applications in battery-powered devices such as hearing aids, smart speakers, smart frames and mobile phones.
The low-power technology places the data processing at the user level—called “at the edge”—rather than bouncing to the cloud or a data center, saving valuable time.
“We’ve really turned into an AI platform company for devices,” Busch said.
Syntiant’s products can also detect audio-based events including glass breaking, smoke alarms and carbon monoxide alarms; products also detect and process voice-activated commands.
Earlier this year the company expanded its range into satellites.
Syntiant has also developed technology for self-driving vehicles that uses vibration sensors to turn a car’s exterior surfaces into microphones, allowing people outside the vehicle to communicate with passengers or the vehicle’s system.
“Using the Syntiant vibration sensor you turn any surface into a microphone,” Busch said in January. “You need to be able to stand outside the car and bark orders it.”
In March, Busch received the Business Journal’s Excellence in Entrepreneurship Award.
Busch also won the Business Journal’s 2020 Innovator of the Year Award. Syntiant is No. 14 on this year’s list of largest OC semiconductor firms.
Two New Members on Syntiant Board
Irvine-based AI company Syntiant Corp. has appointed Adam Spice, chief financial officer of Rocket Lab Corp., and David Lam, chief investment officer of Lam Frontier Technologies and a veteran technology investor, to its board of directors as independent members.
“We’re strengthening the financial experts of our board for the next stage of the company, and I think I’ll leave it at that,” CEO Kurt Busch told the Business Journal on June 8, shortly after the appointments to the board were announced.
Busch has said previously he foresees a public listing for the company, without specifying a time frame.
“Adam brings a vast amount of experience from the financial space,” Busch said.
The CEO called Lam “probably one of the best-connected investors that I have ever worked with in the venture capital world.”
“Adam’s experience helping build one of the world’s leading space companies, combined with David’s long track record of investing in and advising innovative semiconductor and AI companies, will be invaluable as we accelerate our growth and deepen engagement with the investment community,” according to the Syntiant CEO.
