
Launch HN: Sunu (YC S17) – Sonar wristband helping blind people navigate - marco_trujillo
Hey HN! This is Marco, one of the founders of Sunu (<a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sunu.io&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sunu.io&#x2F;</a>). We&#x27;re building a sonar smartband that improves navigation for the visually impaired.<p>Sunu band combines an ultrasonic transceiver, an inertial motion unit plus a haptic module powered by a bluetooth Arm processor. All this hardware together driven by years of observation and product thinking, over 20 years of experience of blind travel training from our advisor Daniel Kish (aka the real life Dare Devil)  and research from the Blind Mobility Research Unit at Nottingham University In England, result in a simple device that gently informs the user of obstacles on their way: proximity, surface density, edges, openings and other information provided in real time. This enables the user to take the best navigation course with ease. It basically works like a new sense: feeling your surroundings at your wrist.<p>I&#x27;m an inventor since I have memory (blame Dexter&#x27;s Lab), and my best friend from childhood is deaf. I thank life to put these two on my way because early on I found my passion creating games and tools with my friend, which eventually lead me to study robotics, develop 7 assistive devices until this last one hit me to pursue something more. During a year long community service at an institution of blind children I had a life-changing experience which made me realize what I really wanted to do: create technology that serves the disabled community starting with a mobility device that helps the blind move freely.<p>I&#x27;m happy to talk and share more. Don&#x27;t forget to share, someone in your community may thank you for that!
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mojomark
I'm not knocking this initiative, I hope it is very successful and helps the
blind. However...

About 10 years ago I sat down with the folks at the Maryland School for the
Blind (1) to demo a similar mini LIDAR based design with haptic feedback. They
thanked me for coming in and promptly brought in a box of similar devices and
contraptions and dumped them on the desk. They told me these devices were
fine, but really they were happy using canes.

What came next blew my mind. They told me what they really wanted/needed was a
way for a blind person to use AutoCAD so that bling people who wanted to work
as engineers or architects could do so. Obviously, that's an exponentially
tougher challenge, but certainly not not doable.

1\.
[http://www.marylandschoolfortheblind.org](http://www.marylandschoolfortheblind.org)

~~~
amorphid
>> They told me what they really wanted/needed was a way for a blind person to
use AutoCAD

That's a fascinating idea. I wonder how that'd work. Is there an existing
interface, that allows a blind person to experience a 3-D object and it's
interior? For example, how would a blind person understand a blueprint for the
Leaning Tower of Pisa, exterior walkways, interior staircases, etc.

~~~
saulrh
The model for the interaction has already been figured out by all of these
tools that people are trying to create, hasn't it? Point a probe into the
world and get back a signal that corresponds to some geometric property of the
world - distance from the probe, edge-detection, etc. It's like virtual
reality: replace the world with a rendered scene and the lidar range detecter
with something like a Vive wand.

~~~
cuauhtli
yes, the trick right here is to have something that is of everyday use, we
actually embedded an IMU and have the ability to recognize the space and map
it with very low power consumption in the wrist. gathering the info from the
environment without the use of a camera that uses a lot of processing power
and mAh. What we developed is a fashionable navigation watch for the blind and
visually impaired.

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shanselman
Super useful, but with respect, your page is an accessibility mess. So much so
that I can't really show it to my blind friends.
[http://wave.webaim.org/report#/http://www.sunu.io/](http://wave.webaim.org/report#/http://www.sunu.io/)

Don't just buy a template. If you care, do the work.

~~~
marco_trujillo
Thanks for the straight feedback and sharing the accessibility tool. Agree we
have to work the accessibility for Low Vision (constrasts, rezicing, colors).
For now it seems to be working very well for people using screen readers. We
are also enhancing it on the go with feedback from people who find new things.
Thanks

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avip
Interested to hear more about the tech - how this differs from existing
products? Is there a reason this product does not exist (if it does - what
makes yours better?) The IP on this kind of things goes +25Y back.

~~~
marco_trujillo
Sure, main difference from previous products are: \- Form factor: prior
devices couldn't get this small, most devices were heavy, obtrusive (mostly
hand held), noisy and not precise (haptic actuators weren't miniaturized and
optimized as today are). Making it wearable allows the user to rely on it only
when they need it and in way that doesn't stick out or represent a hard task
for them to do. \- Connectivity: probable the most powerful factor, none of
the previous was a connected device isolating the device for future
improvements and fixing the way it works for most of the users. Visually
Impaired come in different variants so people have very different navigation
challenges depending on the condition behind their impairment (e.g. some have
light perception, some have minimum peripheral vision or only central vision,
etc), so customization is key. Connectivity permits the device to be
prescribed as the user needs besides from allowing us to gather data and
enhance the technology constantly so it becomes each time more useful. In
general previous products had a "once fit all" approach in an inconvenient
design. There still a few of these devices out there but with low user
adoption.

~~~
kaybe
What does 'connectivity' entail? The way you put it sounds potentially highly
intrusive.

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ciro_langone
Hey! This is super cool, and I wish you the best.

I don't know where you're based out of, but in Washington, D.C. is a school
called Gallaudet University which you may want to reach out to. They are a
school that that provides education for the hard of hearing, and I feel like
they may be the most open to new technologies like this.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallaudet_University

~~~
marco_trujillo
Thanks for sharing, haven't heard of it. I see they teach to Deaf and Blind
(and both) so definitively a fit. Thanks!

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rockmeamedee
Just curious, since your clients are visually impaired people, what steps did
you take to make your website accessible?

It seems to be from a pre-made template, did you check the template ahead of
time? Do you have visually impaired engineers, or do you do things like go
through it with a screen reader/iOS VoiceOver every so often?

~~~
marco_trujillo
Thanks for asking. We did tried to find accessible templates to screen readers
with no luck. So we picked a template we liked and turn it accessible. How? we
found good resources (like [https://webaccess.berkeley.edu/resources/tips/web-
accessibil...](https://webaccess.berkeley.edu/resources/tips/web-
accessibility)), download most used screen readers (NVDA, VoiceOver, Windows
Eyes) did our homework and bounced it with some blind friends to make sure.

~~~
mikekchar
I'm curious why you didn't go the other direction: build an accessible web
page and then try to make it attractive to sighted people. No need for a
template -- just straight HTML with black text on a white background.

I'm not trying to be facetious here. I'm genuinely curious if there are market
pressures that make a "good looking" website higher priority than an
accessible one -- for example a need to look impressive to stake holders who
are not visually impaired.

"We didn't think of that" would be an OK response :-). I'm just curious about
the challenges for a startup in this kind of market and where one might have
to make surprising compromises.

~~~
mholmes680
not OP, but i think the overall challenge is cheaply coming up with a not-
cheap product than can apply to the largest section of the limited market. Its
expensive to advance the tech here, for a limited economic benefit to the
company trying to advance the tech.

As the brother to a visually impaired person, I found the website fine. If
only you could ship by his August 1 birthday! :)

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rogerbinns
What is the angle/spread of the sensor? eg if you point directly in front of
you, then at 2 metres away how wide and tall does it detect things?

In the video you can see someone duck out of the way of an overhanging branch.
I'm curious how much they had to move the sensor to figure that out.

~~~
marco_trujillo
Sure, range and sensitivity can be adjusted from the App, maximum ratings are
5 meters and 35° angle at the sound cone. So at two meters you would be able
to detect head level obstacles with no problem. To improve the receptivity you
can also slightly bend your elbow to give a little angle to your forearm and
aim the band slightly up, that will catch even the ceiling of your room,
fortunately the IMU permits us to understand the position you are aiming and
trim the sound cone only to cover areas that represent a hazard, trying to
drag attention of the user only with needed.

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a_c
A tangential thought, would the ultrasound bring discomfort to pets?

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bramd
Congrats on your launch. As a potential blind user, I've some questions. How
can I reach you? Your email doesn't seem to be listed in your profile.

~~~
marco_trujillo
Thanks for note I'll update my profile. My email is marco@sunu.io you can also
find about us at sunu.io

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dpflan
This is very cool; thanks for sharing. I remember listening to an Invisibilia
episode entitled "How to Become Batman" [1]. It mentioned that blind children
grow up and can learn to use echolocation, generating clicking sounds, to
explore and to understand their surroundings. But the clicking is not socially
acceptable, so many times the child is forced to eschew this technique. I am
curious about this technique, what parts of the brain are involved in that,
and how to improve upon or supplement or complement this technology to assist
the visually impaired by somehow hooking into the similar neuro-pathways used
in the echolocation technique. What're your thoughts on this? Have you had
children us your device yet?

 _::Reference(s)::_

[1] [http://www.npr.org/programs/invisibilia/378577902/how-to-
bec...](http://www.npr.org/programs/invisibilia/378577902/how-to-become-
batman)

~~~
faceplanted
Would it be possible to have headphones, bone conduction or otherwise,
something they can still hear normal sounds through at least, which could
convert an ultrasound "click" played by a speaker into a human audible "click"
so they could use this in place of the audible clicking of human echolocation?

So a high frequency speaker on their head plays the sound, and the headphones
convert the returning reflected sound in the correct frequency range into a
lower frequency and the brain does the rest. Seem like if we can have active
noise cancelling headphones removing sound frequencies, we can have a
headphone with microphones converting a frequency.

~~~
marco_trujillo
Brilliant idea. Daniel Kish has a patent on a similar device that clicks at an
audible frequency, you can adjust the clicking rate, power and pitch
(different pitch provides different information).

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tabeth
Heh, in college a friend and I wanted to make make an "echolocation" headband
that would allow blind people to "see" after watching the video of the young
man who possessed this ability [1].

Unfortunately, neither of us had the hardware expertise to make such a thing
despite buying a Lego Mindstorm and the accompanying ultrasound sensor [2].

Best of luck to you all! The difficult thing we found was teaching blind
people how to use it.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wby1CIhnYWI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wby1CIhnYWI)

[2] [https://shop.lego.com/en-US/EV3-Ultrasonic-
Sensor-45504](https://shop.lego.com/en-US/EV3-Ultrasonic-Sensor-45504)

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ENadyr
Interesting that you are going for a limited direct to consumer model for your
orders. Is this something YC is recommending as means of showing traction? I
remember Thalmic (W13) going for a similar approach, though in their case it
was a pre order campaign.

~~~
marco_trujillo
We are also exploring other specialized channels with good response so far: \-
Sunu band is currently being prescribe at NECO Center for Eye Care in Boston
as it is proving to be a catalizer in the rehab process of patients who lost
their sight. \- We are about to start trials with O&Ms (Orientation and
Mobility Specialists) from the board of AERBVI (Asociation for Education and
Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired) to prove the effectiveness
of the product to be a complimentary mobility aid and a maximizer in the
process of developing O&M skills.

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Raphmedia
I'm getting an antivirus warning when accessing your site :

"Bitdefender Endpoint Security Tools blocked this page The page is blocked by
Bitdefender Endpoint Security Tools Cloud (Malware).

Access from your browser has been blocked."

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maneesh
Marco! This is Maneesh from Pavlok (pavlok.com)! We met on Skype, and your co-
founder worked with me at MassChallenge. Congrats on your success -- I hope I
can help!

~~~
marco_trujillo
Hi Maneesh, good to find you here! your wearable is stunning too, we should
catch up soon. Cheers

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azhenley
This is awesome!

I have always had an interest in this stuff. I recently saw a presentation at
CHI'17 where they used a device that applies temperature changes to the skin
to help people navigate [1].

[1]
[http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3025965](http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3025965)

~~~
marco_trujillo
Awesome! thanks for sharing.

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educar
Apologies for the dumb question but what technologies do blind people use
today?

~~~
teach
My friend who is blind uses an iPhone and a PC with screen reader software
installed. She's a writer and is on Facebook all the time.

~~~
earlyriser
Do blind people have games on their iphones/android phones?

I checked some websites this week but it seems most of the audiogames are
mostly for desktop computers and just a handful of iOS games.

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indescions_2017
Congrats! This is awesome and the best startup idea I've heard in months.
Rooting for you guys and wishing you much success :)

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ludicast
Great idea. Wish you all the luck in the world.

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elmar
Really interesting project, do you envision the usage of this technology on
other use cases like for example robot navigation?

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noir-york
Brilliant! I wish you every success.

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Naushad
All good... but as someone else said. The accessibility for the webpage needs
a proper fix.

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howon92
I love this!!

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ss09
Awesome stuff! Many best wishes.

~~~
fer_albertorio
Thank you.

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abelfiori
Hi Marco, as founder of Flicktek I would like to propose our tech in case you
want to add more functionalities and interaction to your device, check what we
do at flicktek.com!

