Sacramento startup Noopl is a finalist for an innovation award at the 2022 South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, live in person this March.
Going into its 24th year, SXSW is a prestigious festival combining music, film, technology, investing and arts that can provide high-profile exposure to its participants.
Noopl applied for the contest in November for the first time, said CEO Tim Trine.
Noopl, which offers a directional hearing device coupled with a smartphone, is a finalist competing in the category of “Innovation in Connecting People.”
The festival announced the finalists Thursday.
Launched in 2020, Noopl developed a directional hearing aid meant to cancel out irritating background noise. The company sells a smartphone accessory that works with an iPhone and Apple AirPods Pro to select the sound from where a user’s head is pointed, and to cancel out all other directional noise.
The company is selling the product direct-to-consumer as an audio device, so it is not considered a medical device. The Noopl 2.0 sells for $249, and it interfaces with a free app that doesn’t come with a subscription. That compares to hearing aids, which can cost thousands of dollars. Noopl repurposes the audio and accelerometer capabilities of modern smartphones. It started selling the devices last year.
“The Innovation Awards are such a huge part of what we do at SXSW — the title of this competition reflects one of the pillar tenants of the event. And for this year, the quality of entries we received was absolutely off-the-charts,” said Hugh Forrest, chief programming officer with the festival, in a news release announcing the finalists.
The more than 60 finalists in 13 categories are part of a showcase in downtown Austin on March 12, and the winners are announced at a ceremony two days later.
More than 20 California companies are finalists, and Noopl is the only one from the Sacramento area. Only four Texas companies made the finals, and three of them are from Austin.
Noopl was selected earlier this month by the Business Journal as one of 13 Startups to Watch, which are Sacramento-area companies poised to make big moves in 2022.
Noopl raised $5 million in a seed round from venture investors in January 2020. The company is currently raising its second round of growth capital, Trine said.
