“Skullcandy has earned our market-leading position due to a keen obsession with our consumer’s adventurous uses,” says Jason Hodell, CEO at Skullcandy. “Giving our fans the freedom to enjoy their content, control their earbuds and enable communications all without taking off their gloves or letting go of the handlebars is an exciting advancement for our brand.”
The hallmark feature of the platform is the ability to go completely hands-free — an important capability for Skullcandy’s core audience of youthful, adventurous audio consumers. With a simple voice command, users will be able to start and control their media player, even without Internet connectivity – a competitive advantage compared to other brands in the space – as well as accept or reject incoming calls.
As one of the last independent audio brands, Skullcandy is in a unique position to play a truly neutral role in the consumer journey by offering direct access to any native voice assistant on a smartphone. This broad range compatibility ensures seamless functionality for all users, regardless of their phone operating system.
“Skullcandy owns the sub-$100 segment in the US, commanding huge volumes and enabling us to deliver millions of Bragi-enabled earbuds to the market,” says Nikolaj Hviid, Founder and CEO at Bragi. “The partnership with Skullcandy is transformational to Bragi becoming a platform for headphones, just as Android and iOS are for smartphones,” adds Hviid.
Made up of co-developed, system-on-a-chip (SoC) technology, the all-new Skullcandy platform was engineered with updatable firmware. This enables Skullcandy earbuds to receive over-the-air updates as new features become available. Users will be able to update their audio products via the Skullcandy App to add new features, not only enhancing functionality to make them smarter over time but further adding value by extending product lifespan.
“Through a massively scaled design and integration effort with our strategic partners, Skullcandy has developed a scalable, cost-effective, advanced technology platform for software-defined audio products,” says Jeff Hutchings, Chief Product Officer at Skullcandy. “The new platform utilizes a best-in-class, customized Bluetooth SoC along with the Bragi OS to support advanced features like hands-free voice control, customizable button interfaces and more.”
The Skullcandy technology platform – which will launch across three new true wireless products later in 2021 – will also allow users to share audio with others nearby via compatible Skullcandy audio products, take a photo with a button press on the earbud and even end battery anxiety with a verbal update on remaining capacity each time earbuds are activated.
This is the second product announcement confirmed by Bragi since the company announced its Bragi OS and #Bragienabled software strategy for true wireless earbuds and hearables. Bragi is now scaling its technology after investing more than $90 million in software and AI. Bragi’s Software Platform consists of an earphone OS and a smartphone App embedding advanced AI and efficient software.
www.skullcandy.com
www.bragi.com
