Listen Celebrates 20 years of Innovation
Listen Inc is proud to announce its 20th year as a leading provider of audio test and measurement systems and expertise. Two decades of innovation and steady growth have made Listen’s flagship product, SoundCheck, an industry-standard audio test system in the consumer electronics industry.
The company is commemorating the occasion with updated branding – a new, more modern, logo and a new website, www.listeninc.com.
Listen began operations in 1995 when a consulting client of Steve Temme, company founder and president, challenged him to build a computer-based system with the same capabilities as the hardware system that they currently owned. This challenge came with a promise that if Steve could produce the system within 6 months he would buy it. Steve met the challenge, the product was named ‘SoundCheck’, and the customer purchased 12 systems. Steve then began to further develop the product to meet the test requirements of a wider audience.
Although the first generation of SoundCheck was designed specifically for testing military headsets, the next version was designed with a very open architecture which allowed virtually any audio device to be tested. It is this open architecture which has, in part, led to Listen’s success as the system has inherently been able to adapt to the changing test requirements of the audio industry over the past 2 decades. For example, in the 1990’s, SoundCheck was primarily used for testing loudspeaker and microphones, but today its most common applications are testing headphones, microspeakers, smartphones, tablets and Bluetooth devices.
Although Listen has its roots firmly in software, today Listen also offers turnkey systems with a complete line of audio test hardware. Designed from the ground up, Listen’s hardware products are engineered to specifically meet the needs of the audio test industry, thus making them reliable, simple to use and cost effective, as well as tightly integrated with Listen’s software.
Listen is still owned and managed by Steve Temme, and is headquartered in an 8000 square foot facility in the South End of Boston, within a mile of where the company started 20 years ago. Listen also has sales and application engineers on the West Coast, and a worldwide sales and support network. Listen is still growing steadily, and has several open positions in both engineering and sales.
“We at Listen, Inc. are thankful to our many customers for making this anniversary possible,” said Steve Temme, president of Listen, Inc. “Their feedback has driven product development and helped us evolve as a company. We look forward to continuing to innovate with our products and test methods, and to serving our valued customers for many years to come.”
You can learn more about Listen’s ’20 years of Innovation’ by viewing our timeline.
