While Amplifon is not a manufacturer of hearing aids, the company has partnered with manufacturers around the world and focuses on providing audiological services with multiple clinics globally. In India, the company has more than 250 clinics in close to 80 cities, where trained professionals tend to patients by following the process starting with detecting the issue till providing the best possible solutions. The hearing aids available at Amplifon range from invisible hearing aids and Bluetooth-hearing aids to behind-the-ear or in-the-canal hearing aids which are all custom-made for each customer to suit different types of hearing loss and individual lifestyles.
In a conversation with Forbes India, Hassan talks about the company’s catch hold in the Indian market, the hearing health industry, evolving technology and more. Edited excerpts:
Q. Were there any challenges when Amplifon first came to India?
Whenever you enter a new market, it’s always a challenge. I think the first challenge that we’ve been successfully addressing is to build awareness of hearing loss, because the category penetration in India is lower than what we’ve seen in other markets. The first work that we do is educating people in India about the importance of hearing care and the impact that hearing loss can have on your lives.
Q. What is the process that you follow to provide hearing care to people?
First of all, we focus on screening people which we do by making people comfortable to come into our clinics. Else, we come to you and test your hearing, which seems like a basic practice… but there’s a lot of stigma attached around hearing care. People often have questions like: ‘Do I have an issue? Is it really an issue? Can I live with it?’ And the team has worked fantastically through our outreach programmes, or our networks of clinics, through our network audiologists to make that first barrier easier for our customers to break and come to us. We spend a lot of time making sure that we make people feel comfortable, take away the stress/distress, and then test. And once we test, you become aware of whether you have a hearing loss, and if you have a hearing loss, how bad is it. Then we move on to the solutions that you can have in your life that allow you to rediscover the emotions of sound. That’s our purpose. So, as an organisation, we anchor ourselves around our purpose, which helps people rediscover the emotions of sound.
Q. Can you speak about your customer base in India?
In India, we’ve been in the business for 14 years. During these years, we’ve been able to significantly expand our business. We have 260 clinics in India, and we are rapidly expanding that network. In the last two years, we’ve grown our network of clinics by nearly 20 percent. We’re investing in building our network by targeting key metropolitan cities that we want to be in. We’re in 74 cities in India. Our network is across two different areas. We work closely with doctors, ENT specialists specifically, and make sure that we have that first contact point, and we’re present. We’re working with leading ENT doctors in India, and we’re also building our own independent networks, where customers can come to us directly, so that we make it accessible for anybody in India to get to Amplifon.
Q. How do you see technology evolving in the hearing health industry in the next few years?
I think there are a couple of dimensions where we see technology leveraging in this industry. The first is around AI (artificial intelligence)—how AI can improve hearing aids, particularly around noise cancellation and clarity of speech. We have started to see some innovation come through now into the marketplace that we think will help accelerate the quality of hearing solutions that we’re able to provide to our customers. I think that’s the first big transformational change that we’re starting to see already play through. The second dimension of it is very much around adoption. One of the opportunities that we see in hearing aid usages is making sure people are using them on a regular and consistent basis, and then how we can provide ongoing care and ongoing support as an audiological provider to make sure that we are tailoring the device… we are continuing to customise it, working with our customers around accelerating adoption. Because the more they use it, the better experience they will have. These are the two areas where we see technology helping: AI and adoption.
Q. How do you view the competitive landscape in the hearing health sector? And what do you think makes Amplifon different from its competitors?
We have 13 percent share globally as a retailer, although we are the biggest retailers in the world, so that tells you that right now, the industry is relatively fragmented. Therefore, we feel good about our ability to grow within that because we’re the biggest scalable player. I think our competition is good and I respect our competition. Together we all have a role to play to raise the standards of audiological care, build awareness about hearing loss, and make sure that we’re all playing a role in being able to provide hearing care solutions for people who need them. I think we all have a collective purpose. We may phrase it in a slightly different way, but we’re all trying to help people rediscover sound, particularly in our instance, rediscover the emotions of sound. I think being able to change lives in such a positive way makes me proud of the industry that we play in. During this visit in India, I’ve been going into a lot of competitive stores, and I’m impressed with the calibre of audiologists that we have here in the country, and the quality of care that we can get from access to fantastic products.
Why do I think Amplifon is the retailer of choice? There are a couple of things that we have that may make our competition look at us in an envious manner. The first is that we operate in 26 countries, and so, we’re truly a global player in terms of the markets that we operate in. Therefore, I think we understand the consumer incredibly well. We have that first touch point with them. They come to us in that first moment of truth when they finally have accepted that they may have an issue. That really stands us out. Secondly, we put a lot of emphasis around audiological excellence. We ensure that we train, develop, inspire and engage our audiologists to connect with our customers in the right way, test and diagnose in the right way, and provide lifetime care, because once you become a customer, you know our responsibility is to ensure that you continue to have a hearing aid until you need it. We make sure that we have that excellent customer service and we’re able to provide that, and we know that because we have the ability to work with all the manufacturers in the world, that we also have access to the best technologies. Being able to provide that to our customers and offer them choice, which we know is important, I think, is what stands Amplifon out.
We also have the benefit that we operate in diverse markets. We operate in Australia and New Zealand, where category penetration is plus-40 percent. In India, those numbers are in single digits. One of the benefits that we have is that we can take the expertise of those highly mature and developed markets where we built awareness, and bring that to emerging markets like India and China, and build the category awareness in the right way.
Q. Can you speak about Amplifon’s marketing strategy? Is there something specific for India? Is there a collaboration or in any partnership that you have in mind?
A big part of the way that we’ve grown our business is building awareness of the category. We openly communicate through various forums about how we can help with the issue, and the solutions that we can provide. We will continue to invest in this and that’s a critical part of our success agenda over the coming years. The second way that we will invest in marketing will also be to drive traffic, and that traffic is ultimately driven by people having the motivation to want to do something about the issue. We aim to invest in outreach work and make a better opportunity for ourselves to connect with people and tell them that there are solutions available. The other dimension that is also important is the way that we use talent in the region. The audiological excellence that we see in India is as high as any other country in the region. The qualifications and the calibre of audiologists that we have here are fantastic.
Rez Hassan, executive vice president APAC, Amplifon. Image: Bajirao Pawar for Forbes India