Counting the Results of Minuendo's EIC Accelerator Smart Earplugs

Noise-induced hearing loss is the most commonly reported occupational disease in Europe, and it cannot be reversed. Minuendo, a 2018 spin-out from the Norwegian research institute SINTEF, set out to fix a basic problem with the earplugs and earmuffs meant to prevent it: workers take them off because they muffle speech and warning sounds, and nobody knows how much noise actually reaches their ears. In the European Innovation Council's October 2019 round, the Oslo company was selected for blended finance to turn an industrial version of its earplug into a product, according to the European Commission's list of selected companies. The grant part was €993,125, according to CORDIS.

The product exists. It is called Smart Alert, it carried CE and UKCA type approval by the end of the project, and Minuendo still sells it, since May 2025 under a separate brand, Noise Smart. What it has not done is grow into the business the application described. The EIC plan foresaw accumulated sales of €75.12 million by 2026. Minuendo's filed accounts show sales revenue of NOK 5.09 million in 2025, about €0.4 million, down from NOK 10.49 million in 2023.

Where Minuendo Stands Now

Minuendo AS is an active company. The Brønnøysund Register Centre lists no bankruptcy, liquidation or forced dissolution, and its announcements show that the register received the complete 2025 annual accounts on 30 June 2026. Its consumer shop, shop.minuendo.com, sells two passive earplugs for musicians at $179 and from $119. The industrial line now has its own site, noisesmart.com, which presents Smart Alert as a personal noise exposure monitor for workers and their safety managers.

The company has been through a reset. The register shows that the chief executive post was left vacant in April 2024 and that Eirik Gundersen was registered as chief executive in November 2024. Founder Stian Terje Aldrin had been the registered chief executive from the 2018 incorporation, and the register shows no change in between. The board has changed chair three times since 2023. In November 2024 the company took up two convertible loans, and in July 2025 its share capital rose from NOK 420,708 to NOK 898,011, more than doubling the number of shares, according to the same announcements.

The Technology: Earplugs That Measure What Reaches the Ear

Hearing protection is rated in the laboratory, but the protection workers actually get depends on fit and on whether they wear it at all. The CORDIS project report puts it plainly: "The certified protection levels are not achieved in field and the user must decide when and how to use the protection." Electronic "hear-through" earmuffs try to solve the isolation problem with microphones and speakers, which the project objective says produce unnatural sound and poor spatial hearing.

Minuendo's approach is acoustic first. Its earplugs use a patented membrane, developed in research with the Acoustics Research Centre at NTNU, that lowers volume without muffling, according to Mix. Smart Alert adds electronics that measure the noise level towards the eardrum, according to DSD, and alert the wearer during the shift. The earpieces connect to a collar-mounted unit that holds the electronics; at the end of the day the device is docked and its data goes to a cloud platform that emails or texts each worker suggestions, while safety managers see a dashboard, as Minuendo's then chief operating officer Neal Muggleton described it to HSM in June 2022. The system was first pitched at construction, according to Scan Magazine. The difference from a standard noise dosimeter is where it measures: at the ear, behind the protection, rather than in the room.

What the EIC Project Promised, and What CORDIS Shows

MINUENDO INDUSTRY ran from 1 February 2020 to 31 January 2022 with a total cost of €1,418,750. The grant agreement was signed on 26 March 2020. Minuendo AS received €781,322.33 of the EU contribution and its UK subsidiary, Minuendo UK Limited, received €211,802.67 as a linked third party, according to CORDIS. Minuendo AS is the only beneficiary of the project named in the Commission's October 2019 list, and the only CORDIS project in which Minuendo takes part.

The objective described "the world's first HPD that automatically adjusts noise attenuation to safe and suitable sound levels", with smart alerts and long battery life, and set a commercial target of 2.2% of the intelligent hearing protection market by 2026. The final report, for the period to 31 January 2022, says field-tested prototypes, a production process with suppliers and quality assurance for Class 3 personal protective equipment were completed, and that "Both CE and UKCA type approvals have been achieved". It also says commercial work had been "initially impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic".

1. Commercial product from the prototypeDeliveredSmart Alert announced with Reactec in May 2022 (The Scotsman) and still offered in 2026 (Noise Smart).
2. Certification as hearing protectionDeliveredCE and UKCA type approval, per the CORDIS report.
3. Real-time alerts on unsafe noiseDeliveredMeasurement of the noise entering the ear and real-time alerts described by CORDIS, The Scotsman and HSM.
4. Automatic adjustment of attenuationNot shownNo public description of Smart Alert mentions automatic attenuation; the final report does not mention it either.
5. €75.12M accumulated sales and 2.2% market share by 2026MissedTotal sales revenue of NOK 34.4M from 2021 to 2025, per filed accounts.

The project delivered what an EIC grant can fund: a certified product, a production chain and pilot users. The feature that made the proposal "the world's first", automatic adjustment of the attenuation, is not part of any public description of the product, and the sales target was missed by a wide margin.

What Minuendo Has Achieved Since the Award

The equity side of the blended award did reach the company. The EIC Fund portfolio lists Minuendo under the title of the EIC project, and the shareholder list summarised by 21st.ai shows the EIC Fund with 4.14%. The amount and date of the investment are not public. The same list puts SINTEF Venture V at 45.57%, Halden Kommunale Pensjonskasse at 17.02%, Construct Venture at 10.51% and DSD Investering at 4.68%.

Private money followed in 2022. Caplight records a Series A on 9 June 2022 with DSD, Link Capital, MP Pensjon and Wallcross, without an amount; the Norwegian industrial group DSD confirms it became an owner in 2022. The register shows a capital increase registered in May 2022, and the filed accounts show equity turning from minus NOK 11.58 million at the end of 2021 to NOK 19.26 million a year later. The size of the round could not be verified from a primary source.

Commercially, Smart Alert found partners rather than volume. In May 2022 Reactec, an Edinburgh workplace safety firm, integrated Smart Alert data into its analytics platform, according to The Scotsman. The health and safety software firm Riskex now offers a Noise Smart integration with its AssessNET platform. No named industrial customer or deployment size is public. On the consumer side, Minuendo ran an Indiegogo campaign for its LIVE 17dB earplug in June 2023, according to Mix, and its shop claims "80,000+ protected ears", a figure that could not be checked.

The Money

The filed accounts tell a story of a company that grew into 2023 and then cut back hard. Sales revenue rose from NOK 3.49 million in 2021 to NOK 10.49 million in 2023, then fell to NOK 7.40 million in 2024 and NOK 5.09 million in 2025, according to the Brønnøysund accounts register and the filed 2022 accounts. Net losses over the five years add up to NOK 98.5 million. The 2024 loss of NOK 25.93 million includes a tax charge of NOK 10.81 million, the same amount as the deferred tax asset on the 2023 balance sheet, which was written off.

Equity was negative at the end of 2024, at minus NOK 14.26 million, and still negative at the end of 2025, at minus NOK 3.37 million, with debts of NOK 23.57 million and cash of NOK 3.74 million. The 2025 operating loss shrank to NOK 9.59 million, mainly because wage costs fell to NOK 4.92 million, from NOK 13.69 million in 2023.

Why Europe Should Care

Noise at work is regulated across the EU by Directive 2003/10/EC, which sets action values of 80 and 85 dB(A) and an exposure limit of 87 dB(A) that takes the attenuation of hearing protectors into account. That limit depends on how much protection actually reaches the ear, which is exactly what Smart Alert measures. A tool that shows employers and workers real exposure, instead of assumed exposure, fits the EU's occupational safety framework more closely than its industrial or technology strategies. Hearing protection is not a strategic supply chain in the sense of chips or batteries, and Minuendo's case rests on health costs rather than on European autonomy.

The Verdict

Minuendo has not been asked for comment for this article. It is based entirely on public records, company statements and EU project data, linked throughout.