Muse is a Toronto business that provides real-time feedback on their device’s user’s brain activity. We spoke with them to find out more.
What is your business called and what does it do?
We are Muse ® by Interaxon, Inc.
At Muse ®, we live at the heart of personal transformation through human-centred technology. We are a team of engineers, scientists, artists, marketers and developers with the mission to enable people to live a happier, healthier and more connected life with leading brainwave technologies and experiences. Our award-winning neurofeedback devices provide real-time feedback on a user’s brain activity so they can learn the art of meditation. During meditation Muse will translate brain activity into the sounds of weather which will intensify as the user gets more distracted and calm when they are able to calm their busy mind. The Muse S headband, our latest release, is a comfy and flexible EEG headband that can be worn overnight to help you understand and track how well you focus, sleep, and recharge so you can refocus during the day and recover each night. We have sold more portable EEG devices than any other system in history and facilitated millions of minutes meditated across the globe.
What made you want to do this work?
Now more than ever, mental wellness has become a growing area of importance for individuals to improve their lives. At Muse, we want to help people live happier, healthier and more connected lives. Research shows that meditation helps people sleep better, stress less and focus more. With Muse, we make meditation easy through real-time feedback in order to help users establish a satisfying meditation practice – something that can be difficult to do if you aren’t getting feedback on your practice.
What problem did you want to solve with the business?
The benefits of meditation are now widely known but… meditation can be hard!
For most people who have tried meditation, they can attest to the fact that it’s much more difficult than just sitting quietly with your eyes closed. Most people also don’t have access to a meditation instructor or guide that can give them personalized feedback on their practice.
At Muse, we created the only brain-sensing headband that takes the guesswork out of meditation. With built-in sensors, Muse detects and measures the activity of a user’s brain and body, and provides real-time biofeedback to help them know when they are in the zone and keep them motivated to build a practice. In an April 2021 survey, 86% of users felt they understood how to meditate better with Muse, 77% said they had a better handle on their stress after using Muse and 78% said in that survey that they were calmer and more relaxed throughout the day. Also, 40% said they felt like their sleep has improved since using Muse and 41% said they are falling asleep faster, too.
Who are your clientele/demographics?
We work for everyone, and we sell to real people. Our customers either struggle with work-life balance, are looking to optimize their mental performance, have difficulty sleeping or already have a meditation practice and are looking to go deeper. We see males and females – mostly younger professionals and many of them tend to be in the medical, financial or tech-focused industries who benefit from meditation and mindfulness in their jobs. Overall, Musers are career-driven, tech-savvy and looking to improve themselves for the better.
How does your business make money? How does it work?
We are a hardware and a subscription-based company that offers stand-alone hardware devices primarily online through our eCommerce store along with premium subscriptions that offer more than 500 meditations on a variety of themes from sleep to stress and performance and focus from renowned meditation instructors with new content added every month.
Where in the city can we find your profession?
Muse Headquarters are based in Toronto.
What is the best question a prospective customer could ask a member of your profession when comparing services? Give the answer as well.
I already meditate. Why do I need technology to help me? Muse offers novice and experienced meditators a chance to gain deeper insights on their practice with real-time feedback while motivating them along the way. It also allows them to explore other types of meditation and ways to connect with their body, mind and brain. Plus, we are constantly evolving our technology. We recently introduced Muse Biofeedback+. It was one of our top requested features of all time. Now, Muse subscribers can now layer real-time biofeedback on top of their favourite music, meditation, or other external content and receive post-session reporting to see how their brain & body responded. Now you can see how your brain responds in real-time to your favourite song, show, or meditation in all of your favourite apps, from Spotify to Calm, Headspace to Audiobooks and YouTube. While you enjoy your favourite meditation or music, Muse will be hard at work tracking your brain and giving you biofeedback in real-time. After your session, you can see your brain activity and get personalized post-session reports to explain what it all means.
What is the best part about what you do? What is the worst part?
We help users meditate by providing real-time biofeedback on their meditative state using the Muse app. We love hearing from Musers about how they have benefited from an ongoing meditation practice including their overall well-being, focus and performance. The worst part is probably being able to be accessible to a more narrow range of people with our products and services, as the price point of our devices can be a barrier to entry for those with less disposable income.
What is your favourite joke about your own profession?
Less of a joke and more of an ongoing theme that although we’re a meditation company, we’re also a growing business that has all the same demands and stresses as a growing business does. We have a constant reminder when things are extra busy that we need to practice what we preach and remember to take a breath!
Where can we follow you?
Follow us on our website and our Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
PAY IT FORWARD: What is another local business that you love?
Hoame Meditation studio is a gorgeous in-person meditation studio just down the street from our Toronto office that has a wide range of different practice experiences and a great community environment.
