Music, loud voices, laughter. Amid the hubbub of this lively restaurant, a guest’s eyes turn towards his neighbor at the table. The voice of the interlocutor then resonates, louder and clearer. Conversely, the ambient din is muffled. And the conversation begins, facilitated by… glasses. Similar in appearance to any pair from EssilorLuxottica. Except that its branches contain a concentrate of technology worthy of the gadgets of Impossible mission.
A network of microphones transmits sounds processed by an algorithm, which evaluates their origin and filters the information, focusing on the voice of the person we are looking at to amplify it, while reducing parasitic noise. To develop this system, the optical giant relied on the expertise of Nuance, an Israeli start-up acquired at the end of 2022. It also gives its name to this range of sober models, available in black. and in burgundy: Nuance Audio.
A practical and aesthetic invention
“It’s a real breakthrough innovation,” says Paul du Saillant, the eyewear manufacturer’s deputy general manager. In more than one way. Firstly by this ability to adapt the sound, according to the orientation of the face. But also by his discretion, which the secret agent played by Tom Cruise in the famous saga would not deny. No more bulky boxes around the pinna and in-ear headphones obstructing the ear. The advantage is practical – no collisions between branches and prostheses – but also aesthetic, in a society where we are more likely to equip ourselves to see better than to hear better.
Finally, there is no need to go to your hearing care professional to fine-tune the settings: in about a minute, Nuance Audio adapts to the user’s body shape and knows how to recognize their tone. Using a smartphone application, he can indicate whether his environment is quiet, noisy, outdoors, and modulate the volume of his own voice. “We are looking for comfort, simplicity and style. And for a more accessible price than current hearing aids,” summarizes the owner of the Ray-Ban, Oakley and Persol brands.
A step ahead of Gafam
For its debut, EssilorLuxottica is targeting a population younger than the average hearing aid recipient and with mild to moderate hearing loss – 1.25 billion people would be affected. A logical incursion, according to Cédric Rossi, financial analyst at Bryan Garnier: “Many optical chains are already present in hearing, like Alain Afflelou and Atol in France, or Fielmann in Germany.” Should we also expect competition from digital giants? “Google Glass was a failure, Meta ended up joining forces with Ray-Ban… Gafam cannot combine technology and pleasure. Not to mention style, an essential element for glasses,” points out the expert.
The Nuance Audio will be launched in the second half of the year in the United States, where a medical prescription is not necessary. Familiar territory: the group generates almost half of its turnover in North America. In Europe, you will have to wait until 2025. Until then, the augmented frame will be tested in real conditions, to ensure that it is well tolerated and that its battery lasts from morning to evening. She is also starting a tour of trade shows, starting with the CES in Las Vegas, the international meeting for consumer electronics which is taking place these days. A first for EssilorLuxottica. And the opportunity to demonstrate its strength in terms of R & D – no less than 1.7 billion euros of investment between 2020 and 2022.
500 million customers per year
The origins of Essilor date back to the Société des Lunetiers, a workers’ cooperative founded in 1849. Since then, the French company, which has become the world’s number 1 in optics, has grown through acquisitions. In recent years, two operations have changed its size. The merger, in October 2018, with the Italian Luxottica, the king of frames founded by Leonardo Del Vecchio. And the acquisition three years later, by the new group, of the Dutch GrandVision networks: GrandOptical, Solaris, Générale d’optique…
As a result of these major maneuvers, EssilorLuxottica controls around a quarter of the international optics market valued at 110 billion euros, ahead of the German Zeiss and the Japanese Hoya, and controls the entire value chain, from lens manufacturing devices to the design of frames, including distribution. “The combination of the two companies allowed them to improve the efficiency of research, with work on the entire glasses. The deployment in hearing is the illustration of this synergy,” estimates analyst Cédric Rossi. A few figures reflect its power. A portfolio of 150 brands, 18,000 stores, almost 200,000 employees in more than 150 countries. “We serve 500 million consumers every year,” adds Paul du Saillant. With a market capitalization of more than 80 billion euros, EssilorLuxottica is in the top 10 of the CAC40.
China, a nation of myopes
The growth drivers are still considerable. The number of people requiring vision correction worldwide is estimated at 4.7 billion. Less than half are equipped. Aging of the population and new habits of reading on screens are the inexhaustible drivers of optics, particularly in China where Franco-Italian is still not very present (around 5% of sales). Innovation is key to thriving in this immense nation of short-sighted people. The group is also successfully deploying its Stellest lenses, which slow the progression of this distance vision disorder in children.
Will it replicate Varilux’s feat? These progressive lenses, invented more than sixty years ago in France, which Essilor has continued to perfect with a new generation every five or six years, appeal to an ever-widening audience: numbering 2.4 billion today, presbyopes could pass the 4 billion mark by 2050. The latest creation, Varilux and the functioning of the visual system, explains Sébastien Fricker, head of the R & D design department. For several years, our methodology has been supplemented by simulation tools, with “virtual carriers”, with the aim of increasing the number of tests performance of products, even if humans remain extremely complex to model.
The “XR” generation nevertheless has something more: while this digital twin was previously based on equations, this time it is based on behavioral artificial intelligence. “We processed a million pieces of data to build a predictive model of the behavior of wearers, for example on the way they use their smartphone to find their way, the eye moving from the GPS screen to the street signs. allows you to gain an additional notch of performance”, adds Sébastien Fricker, who leads a team of engineers based in Créteil, in the Paris region, in the group’s largest research center.
A champion with European roots
French pride in this binational company, whose beginnings were marked by the fear of seeing a tricolor star passing under the Italian flag. It is true that the Del Vecchio family holding company holds 32% of the capital when the French State owns less than 4%, notably through Bpifrance. “When governance was reviewed in 2021, out of twelve key positions, ten went to Italians. Today, the decision-making center is located in Milan more than in Paris,” says a good connoisseur of the company. Since June 2022 and the death of Leonardo Del Vecchio, Francesco Milleri has been CEO. On the French side, we recall that the headquarters remained in Charenton-le-Pont (Val-de-Marne), and that a new laboratory will open in Wissous (Essonne) in 2024, an investment of more than 50 million euros. Once the hatchet was buried, this rapprochement above all allowed the emergence of an international champion with European roots. A model that the Old Continent would be well advised to promote. Unless you remain deaf to the sirens of global competition.
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