Doppler Labs

Lore & Background

Doppler Labs was co-founded by Noah Kraft, Fritz Lanman, and Dan Wiggins, who was fired in 2015. Kraft had previously worked in entertainment and as a strategic consultant for Google on the mobile game Ingress, and also worked for Lyor Cohen during the founding of 300 Entertainment. Lanman was a Microsoft executive and prominent angel investor. The company envisioned that computing would move onto the body and into the ear, with voice becoming a primary interface for human-technology interaction.

The company's first product was DUBS Acoustic Filters, high-tech earplugs using a proprietary 17-piece physical acoustic filter system to reduce sound pressure at different frequencies while maintaining acoustical fidelity. In July 2016, Doppler Labs launched Here Active Listening at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival. In 2017, it launched its flagship product Here One, a pair of wireless smart earbuds that allowed users to selectively filter ambient sound, stream music, amplify speech, take phone calls, and selectively filter sounds like background noise. In March 2017, Doppler Labs sued Bose for trademark infringement of their Here Buds trademark. The company supported the Over-the-Counter Hearing Aid Act of 2017.

On November 1, 2017, Doppler Labs announced it would wind down operations, citing problems raising additional Series C funding. The company officially closed on December 1, 2017. Wired reported that the company unsuccessfully explored options including partnership, investment, and acquisition from companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon, and Facebook. It was preparing to launch its next product, Here Two, in 2018. In 2018, Dolby bought most of the remaining IP assets of Doppler Labs under the direction of Kraft. As of May 14, 2024, Wiggins acquired the trademark for Doppler Labs.

Reader's Guide

Doppler Labs occupies a significant place in the history of personal audio as a pioneer of the smart earbud category. Before Apple's removal of the headphone jack, the launch of AirPods, and the prevalence of Alexa, Doppler Labs envisioned and built in-ear computing devices that combined audio filtering, music streaming, and voice communication. The company's Here One earbuds were called the world's first in-ear computer, and the category it helped create was expected to become a $40 billion industry by 2020. Despite raising over $50 million in funding from prominent investors including Henry Kravis, David Geffen, and Dan Gilbert, and forming partnerships with major organizations like the New York Philharmonic, JetBlue, and Coachella, the company could not secure additional Series C funding and shut down in late 2017. Its intellectual property was later acquired by Dolby, and its trademark was acquired by co-founder Dan Wiggins in 2024. The company's trajectory illustrates both the ambition and the challenges of early movers in the wearable audio space.

Did You Know?

• Doppler Labs' Here One was called the world's first in-ear computer.
• Doppler Labs sued Bose for trademark infringement in March 2017.