Tech products in works for disabled

Hadeel Ayoub slips a black glove onto her hand before starting the swish of sign language that is meaningless to the untrained observer. Then she pushes a button on her wrist, and a small speaker relays the message drawn in the air: “Let’s Dance!”

“My dream is to give a voice to those who can’t speak,” says the 36-year-old inventor, who is developing her BrightSign glove while working toward a doctorate in assistive technology at Goldsmiths, University of London.

Ayoub’s glove is just one example of a bigger trend as entrepreneurs, startups and companies such as Microsoft and Google try to harness the power of artificial intelligence to make life easier for people with disabilities. The initiatives come as the World Health Organization estimates that the number of people needing assistive devices from wheelchairs to communication technologies will double to 2 billion by 2050.

Improvements in artificial intelligence, combined with the decreasing cost of hardware, are making it possible for inventors to develop new products without the need for the deep pockets of governments or corporations.

Microsoft and Google are trying to spur work in this area, offering a total of $45 million in grants to developers of assistive technologies.

While Ayoub hopes her efforts pay off financially, she says she is driven by a desire to create a world where disabilities become meaningless. She is trying to raise $1.3 million to bring BrightSign to the market.

The need for such products is only going to increase as the world’s population ages, increasing the number of people with physical, cognitive, vision and hearing problems, according to a WHO report published this year. The challenge is to develop new technologies while increasing the availability of simple devices such as spectacles and wheelchairs that many people can’t afford.

Companies are starting to recognize the financial potential of the market, as the innovations can improve products sold more widely, says Hector Minto, who has the unusual title of “accessibility evangelist” at Microsoft.

Microsoft last year launched its free Seeing AI app, which turns a smartphone into a “talking camera” that helps visually impaired people do things like scan and read aloud text, recognize faces and identify products bar codes. Similar technology goes into the company’s text Translator service, which costs businesses $10 to $45,000 a month, depending on the number of transactions.

Innovation has not yet produced products good enough to offer complete freedom for the impaired, says Tom Kamber, executive director of Brooklyn-based Older Adults Technology Services, a nonprofit that helps the elderly use technology. But there is reason for optimism because investors are looking for the next big thing in technology, he says.