consumer ENTREPRENEURS
technology
can be listened to wired or wireless and also feature a digital
microphone for taking calls. If I had one complaint, it’s that
they are a very chunky set of cans and felt a little weighty
on the head compared to my over-ear Sennheisers. While
product design was of course important, Pinkas explained,
Ora’s main focus was always going to be substance over style.
“As you can imagine, given Ora’s limited resources as a
startup, we had to prioritise certain aspects of our product
development,” he said. “The vast majority of our efforts went
on the development of our material science technology and
making sure its implementation generated the levels of
sound realism that is expected from graphene’s ‘supermanlike’
properties. Unfortunately, with under five employees
directly working on the GQ Headphones, there was no way we
could compete with the resources big brands like Bose and
Beats may have for flawless product design. And we are OK
with that, they can beat us on the design build, we can beat
them on what matters to us - sound quality.”
Although the company has raised cash through
crowdfunding and will be delivering GQ headphones to
its backers, Pinkas says the long-term future for Ora is
unlikely to be as a consumer brand. Instead, he envisions
GQ technology being licensed out to established electronics
manufacturers – similar to the Dolby business model – who
are looking to incorporate some graphene wizardry into their
products.
“At one point we thought about pursuing both B2B and
B2C strategies, but the pull from big consumer brands was so
aggressive - especially those working with micro-speakers -
that we are most likely going to focus on getting GrapheneQ
ready for integration in other companies’ devices,” said
Pinkas.
“We are basically a bunch of chemists, materials
scientists, audio engineers…there’s not many marketers
at Ora. The plan at the moment is to focus our efforts on
including our patented graphene materials inside the next
generation of consumer devices – we’re already working
closely with major brands paying us to develop solutions for
their headphones, hi-fi tweeters, TVs, smart speakers, laptops
and even smartphones.”
The focus on graphene’s technical benefits rather
than simply its marketability as a new wonder material is
what should ultimately separate Ora from the snake oil and
the shysters. As well as endorsements from Grammy-winning
classical conductors, GQ has been acknowledged by Kostya
Novoselov as “one of the first consumer products to
feature a high-content graphene technology.” When he and
Andre Geim were collecting their Nobel Prizes over a decade
ago, headphones and speakers were probably not at the
forefront of their thoughts, but GrapheneQ might just be
the first mainstream application that’s worthy of their
discovery.
Material
benefits
The low density
and high stiffness
of the graphene
has enabled the
development of a
light weight and
highly efficient
speaker membrane
May 2020 / www.theengineer.co.uk 28
/www.theengineer.co.uk