Photo: “I heard a glass drop and then I suddenly thought, I could find a clue to do this”: Dr. Henry Luo on his ‘aha’ moment.


Moments of brilliance can come at the most unexpected times.

For Dr. Henry Luo, a researcher at Kitchener-based hearing aid manufacturer Unitron, his breakthrough came well outside the confines of the lab.

“At the [Unitron] Christmas party … I heard a glass drop and then I suddenly thought, I could find a clue to do this,” says Luo.

He quickly grabbed the nearest piece of paper – a calendar off the wall – and wrote down what he thought might be the key to solving a problem for hearing-aid users that had plagued researchers for 20 years.

The problem is acoustic shock – a sudden impulse sound, like a glass breaking or a door slamming, which is hard for hearing-aid users to distinguish from other noises, such as a conversation. These sudden sounds can cause discomfort, but at the same time, eliminating them could be dangerous.

Luo thought he had found a clue that would help eliminate the discomfort of acoustic shock, but still leave the user aware of the relevance of the sound.

It was this ‘aha’ moment in 2004 that eventually earned Luo a prestigious honour: the David E. Mitchell Award of Distinction, presented by the Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation, for his patented AntiShock technology. The award, which he received in October, comes with $25,000 and is considered Canada’s equivalent to the Nobel Prize.

By removing the discomfort of sudden noises, Luo’s innovation not only improves the lives of hearing-aid users, but removes one of the barriers to people using the devices in the first place.However, this award-winning innovation couldn’t have happened without a great deal of persistence, tenacity and the ability to overcome moments of hopelessness.For Luo, it also meant taking the road less travelled.

“I started studying engineering, but I come from five generations of medical doctors, and I always wanted to do something relating to helping people to hear,” he says.

After completing his electrical engineering degree in Shanghai, Luo left his native China looking to combine his training with the family trade.

“In 1991, I went to England to study biomedical engineering, which is the connector between engineering and medical fields,” he says. “At the time, I studied for intelligent hearing aids, and at the time there were no digital hearing aids.”

Limited by the technology of the day, Luo was like an artist without a canvas, waiting to paint his masterpiece. So he had to bide his time while he pushed forward in the industry, which sent him to Japan and a quick stint in the United States.

“I had a lot of ideas that I wanted to do, but you have to have the digital technology to allow you to start,” he says.

This led Luo to Unitron, whose early development of the digital platform drew him to Waterloo Region. Finally, he had the platform on which to build something that could truly change the lives of people with hearing loss.

His early experience and training helped him find innovative answers to problems, but Luo credits much of his success to the calibre of talent around him at Unitron.

About the Manning Awards


Considered one of Canada’s most prestigious awards and modelled after Sweden’s Nobel Prize, the Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation recognizes Canada’s top innovators.

It was started in 1982 by Ernest C. Manning, who was Canada’s youngest cabinet minister and Alberta premier, and David E. Mitchell, CEO of Alberta Energy Company.

Every year $165,000 is spread among the four award recipients, which range from the $100,000 principal award to the $10,000 innovation award.

More than $4.5 million has been awarded to some 200 Canadians who have revolutionized Canada’s approach to manufacturing, communication and social behaviour, making it a stronger competitor in the global market.

The Manning Awards are distinct from other innovation awards by focusing not only on good ideas, but ones that have made an impact commercially and on society.

Dr. Henry Luo is the latest among winners from Waterloo Region, who include BlackBerry’s Mike Lazaridis and Gary Mousseau, who were principal award co-recipients for the BlackBerry single mailbox architecture in 2002.


“I was one of the first in the world to develop the digital hearing aid, and I started to apply many ideas and the knowledge I’d learned. And yet, at the same time, I learned more here through my colleagues - expert audiologists.”

It was one of his colleagues who drove Luo to figure out a solution to acoustic shock.

“It was eight years ago that Don (Hayes), the director of audiology, came to me and said, ‘All the shock sounds are making everyone not want to wear hearing aids,’” Luo says. “It’s because they are scared; they don’t know what the sounds are, so a lot of times they put the hearing aid in the drawer.”

At the Unitron Christmas party, Luo actually heard two glasses drop; one during a noisy moment, and the other when it was quieter. The difference in how he perceived the same sound in two different scenarios prompted him to rethink the way he viewed the problem of acoustic shock. He realized that he could modify the way a sudden impulse signal is detected and then control it in real time.

“Eighty per cent of the technology is detection, and if you can’t detect it reliably you can’t do anything,” says Luo, explaining AntiShock.

The sophisticated algorithm – now in every Unitron device – is able to detect and isolate the acoustic shock from the surrounding sounds and dampen it as it occurs, allowing conversation to be heard over the noise.

It took Luo and the team at Untiron another two years to refine AntiShock before its release in 2006, and not without difficulty.

“We tried many, many approaches and many, many technologies we know we have, but not one could really do the job,” he says. “So in your mind, you kind of feel hopeless, and then I think that I must be able to do something and then I just continue. That’s the only way. Many people just stop before they hit success, but we didn’t stop and we just continued.”

Even after seven years on the market, AntiShock is still the market leader.

“Usually a new technology may only last two or three years, then we have something new overtake that,” Luo says, “but this one has been on the market for seven years and nobody can do anything close to us.”

Luo entered AntiShock for the Manning award in 2009 and was a 2010 finalist, but didn’t take home the prize. He was encouraged by the Manning organization and by Unitron to reapply, leading to this year’s win.

Ahead of his time when he applied the first time, Luo won on the second try due to the impact and commercial success of AntiShock, with more than five million people wearing devices equipped with his innovation.

Although honoured by the recognition, that’s not what motivates him to create a new innovation almost every year.

“I love that what I do means people benefit and have better lives, and that’s the biggest reward,” says Luo. “When I do it, I don’t really think about any Manning award or something. When you do it, it’s because you think that people need it and we can come up with something to help the people, and that’s my life and my job too.”