Can a pair of earbuds that help you get to sleep illustrate the strategy and ambition of a single company? Soundcore’s Sleep A30 Smart ANC Earbuds can. Launched into the UK consumer market this week, the path of the Sleep A30 to market and what comes after it is a microcosm of Soundcore itself.
In the run-up to the launch, I had the opportunity to sit down with Andy Fucha, Soundcore’s Business Manager, to learn more.
The Sleep A30’s Anker Connection
Soundcore is a brand of Anker Innovations, a Chinese electronics manufacturer founded in 2011. The Soundcore brand was introduced at CES 2018 to provide consumers with the best sound and experience. One of the brand’s goals was to establish itself as a leader in the sound space.
With notable products launched since then (including its Liberty 3 Pro true wireless earbuds developed alongside 20 Grammy-winning music producers), Soundcore is now established with four main product lines: true wireless earbuds, open ear earbuds, headphones, and sleep earbuds.
“There are new things we can do,” Fucha explains, “that are anchored around sound. We try our best to go beyond song to give an experience that consumers haven’t imagined. That’s why we entered into a territory that nobody is playing in… sleep earbuds.”
Introducing The Sleep A30 Earbuds
The Sleep A30 feature many of the traditional wireless earbuds features. You have active noise cancellation, a choice of tips to ensure the best fit in your ear canal, and the ability to decide how much sound you want to remove. Additionally, you have a charging case with a much larger battery, and all of these expectations are met.
Yet these are put together with a slightly different goal in mind: to provide you with a peaceful night’s sleep. It achieves this through the reduction of ambient noise by ANC, specifically by picking and tuning out snoring from your partner with its adaptive snore masking, as well as offering various audio playback options. These include binaural beats, soundscapes and the option to play your own audio and have it stop when the earbuds sense you have fallen asleep.
Having spent time with the older Sleep A20 earbuds and the new Sleep A30, the mission goal of “help you sleep” is one that Soundcore has achieved. Forbes contributor Mark Sparrow has explored the technology and the impact of the Sleep A30 buds in detail:
“The Soundcore Sleep A30 earbuds can block out up to 30dB of noise using Soundcore’s Smart ANC. The charging case for the earbuds has been upgraded to include Adaptive Snore Masking technology that can block out the sound of a bed partner who is “sawing wood or chopping logs” on the other side of the mattress.”
Soundcore’s Sleep A30 Kickstarter Decision
The launch of the Sleep A30 buds will not come as a surprise to those watching this space. They first appeared on Kickstarter in June, almost fully formed. The campaign saw 18,682 backers pledging over $3 million, with every backer receiving a Sleep A30. This is a similar pattern to the launch of the Sleep A10 and Sleep A20. Isn’t that an unusual approach from an established company?
“A big company can have a niche or early-stage product,” Fucha points out. “If we launch traditional true wireless earbuds, that’s launching into a sophisticated market with a large user base. Sleep is still a niche market, and we see Kickstarter as a platform for the early adopter audience.
“We’ll use Kickstarter as long as we can find the early adopters, help us understand the market and the additional expectations.”
Sleep Buds and the broader sleep market are still in their early stages, which makes it hard to measure the potential. Stratis Research suggests the sleep tracker market is worth $16.52 billion in 2025, with a projection of $40 billion by 2034. Soundcore believes that the current sleep buds market is around $1.3 billion with an annual growth of thirty percent.
Given this relatively empty space, Soundcore can shape the market around its own research and beliefs in what sleeping buds could and should be doing. Which goes back to the idea of establishing leadership in the sound space.
After The Sleep A30
What comes next?
“One of the lessons from the sleep earbuds is we need to keep challenging ourselves. We shouldn’t follow, because when we follow, we cannot grow the category… we just compete with others.”
“We need to start from the consumers’ real needs, and can we do better? If we can, let’s put the investment in, the capability, and the resources to make great products that create value for the users.”
No space is going to remain the purview of a single manufacturer. At some point, the competition will turn up, and in any discussion of mobile music and the implicit pairing to a smartphone, there is a rather large elephant in the room. Apple’s AirPods remain the most popular wireless earbuds with iPhone users. CIPR reports that the AirPods have a 59 percent market share in their digital home territory. What happens if Tim Cook and his team decide to move into the sleep buds space?
“When others follow, I feel proud. They recognise the value we have created. Take that example of ‘better sleep.’ The challenge has been there for years. There’s a big proportion struggling with their sleeping. We have established a lot of solutions to solve this challenge.
Which feeds back into the core mission of Soundcore that helped define the Sleep A30: to provide superior sound experiences, meet consumer needs, and continue to innovate.