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Turning Hearing Science into Better Audiology Consultations
Latest Media
Middle Tech Podcast: Shingles Took His Hearing at 40 — Now Jeff Cummins Is Fixing How Hearing Aids Are Sold
CEO Jeff Cummins joins the Middle Tech podcast to share how losing most of his hearing to shingles at 40 led him to co-found Immersive.
Listen to the episode →Webinar RecordingDemos That Convert — July 23 Webinar Recording
Watch the full recording of our live session on how high-performing audiology clinics create more confident treatment decisions.
Watch the recording →Our story
From a UofL research lab to clinics that span two continents.
Immersive Hearing Technologies began as a research initiative at the University of Louisville in 2020, where a team of expert research scientists set out to better understand how individuals perceive sound through hearing aids in real-world settings.
What started in the lab quickly turned into something more practical. The team realized that the same technology used for research could help solve a very real problem in hearing care: giving patients a way to truly understand how hearing devices perform in real-world environments before making a purchase decision.
In 2023, the company was officially founded to bring this work out of the lab and into clinics. Since then, Immersive has gone through significant customer discovery and iteration, taking the product from a more elaborate version that included a virtual reality headset to Engage, the clinical tablet-based SaaS model used in clinics today.
Immersive worked with hearing aid manufacturers to highlight the features and benefits of today's latest technology, deploying systems in 2025 in experience rooms across Western Europe. That same year also featured pilot deployments of Engage in the southeastern United States. The official Engage clinical tablet-based software release is set for fall 2026.
360° Ambisonic Camera Rig
On-Location Recording
How It Works
Our proprietary scene capture uses sophisticated ambisonic microphones and virtual reality cameras.
Our proprietary recording process combines specialized acoustic facilities, real-world scene capture, and recordings made through actual hearing aid technology.
The team
Invented by Scientists and Built by Entrepreneurs
Jeff Cummins, MBA
CEO & Co-Founder
Based out of Louisville, KY, Jeff joined Immersive in 2023 to run the operational and financial side of the company. Beyond his passion for startups, he's also worn hearing aids since 2012, so he knows what it's like to sit in the clinic, presented with options, and unsure what to think.
Dr. Matthew Neal
Co-Founder
Dr. Pavel Zahorik
Co-Founder
Academic roots
A University of Louisville partnership from day one.
Engage's audio rendering approach was developed out of University of Louisville research into how individuals actually perceive sound through hearing aids in real-world settings, not a static test booth. That research foundation, led by co-founders Dr. Matthew Neal and Dr. Pavel Zahorik, is what makes a personalized, environment-specific demo possible in the first place.
Have research to share?
If your clinic has outcomes data or a story worth featuring here, we'd love to hear it. Case studies from real deployments are exactly what this section is built for.
Get in touch →Research & Case Studies
Built on research, proven in clinics.
Here's the science behind Engage, and what we're learning as it reaches real patients.
2025 Pilot Deployments: Western Europe & the Southeastern U.S.
Engage moved from research prototype to real clinics in 2025, with experience-room deployments across Western Europe and pilot deployments across the southeastern United States.
The Research Behind Engage
Engage is built on a patent-pending VR audio rendering approach developed out of the University of Louisville, capable of producing an accurate simulation of hearing-aid-processed listening.
Curious how clinics get up and running? See our training & implementation guides →