Greater Detroit Agency for the Blind and Visually Impaired - Technology Suppliers

Greater Detroit Agency
for the Blind and Visually Impaired
16625 Grand River Avenue
Detroit, MI 48227
313-272-3900
FAX: 313-272-6893
E-Mail:

Southeast Michigan's Resource Promoting Independence through Vision Rehabilitation

Suppliers of Adaptive Technology
and Special Needs Products

This page contains web sites and contact information for companies and organizations noted for producing adaptive technology for people with visual impairments. The vendors on this page offer a broad range of services, and it is very difficult to categorize them. We have chosen, instead, to present an alphabetical list to provide "one-stop shopping" for suppliers and catalog houses. For information on sources of literature accessible to the visually impaired, please see our Literature Resources page.

Table of Contents

Click on the vendor name in this table of contents to move to that vendor's information on this page.

Adobe Acrobat Access

Adobe is a software company famous for the popular Acrobat Reader for PDF (Portable Document Format) documents. PDF documents are frequently encountered on the World Wide Web and as documentation for various software programs. Unfortunately, PDF documents have been inaccessible to blind users due to their graphically rich nature and the inaccessibility of tools for reading them. The Adobe Acrobat Access web site provides information and tools giving three separate approaches to accessing PDF documents for blind and visually impaired computer users.

Ai Squared

Ai Squared is the manufacturer of the noted ZoomText screen magnification programs for MS-DOS and Windows.

Alva B.V

Alva B.V, based in the Netherlands, is a well-known manufacturer of refreshable braille displays. Alva recently acquired all assets of Berkeley Access, the access technology division of Berkeley Systems in the U.S. Berkeley Systems was known for its OutSpoken for the Macintosh and Microsoft Windows. Berkeley Access is now known as Alva Access Group, Inc

Ann Morris Enterprises

Ann Morris Enterprises is a consumer products catalog service catering to the special needs of people with a visual impairment.

Aroga

Aroga is one of the largest distributors of assistive technology products in Canada. They provide both technology recommendations and the technology itself for people with various disabilities including visual impairment.

Artic Technologies

Artic Technologies is noted for its Business Vision and WinVision screen readers for MS-DOS and Windows. Artic has other products, as well, including computerized notetakers and print magnifying devices.

Biolink

Biolink was the first to develop a talking screen reader for Microsoft Windows NT. They offer screen reading and screen enlargement software for the visually impaired.

Choice Technology & Training

Choice Technology & Training is a British company specializing in inexpensive screen reading and screen magnification software as well as training for the visually impaired. Their feature products are LookOUT, a screen reader selling for 80 British pounds, Magnus, a screen magnifier selling for 80 pounds, and DUAL, a combined speech and magnification program for 120 pounds.

Compusult Limited

Compusult Limited is a high technology company in its fourteenth year of providing innovative solutions for the visually and reading impaired. They specialize in speech technology, automatic identification, and Internet applications.

Dancing Dots

Dancing Dots is the manufacturer of the GOODFEEL Braille Music Translator for Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows NT. The program operates with a number of commercially available MIDI and music sequencer packages to produce braille music scores complete with lyrics. Dancing Dots also offers a braille music transcription service. Bill McCann is a blind musician who founded the company to increase availability of braille music materials.

Dolphin Computer Access

Dolphin Computer Access is the American branch of Dolphin Computer Access Limited of the United Kingdom. Dolphin produces an assortment of software and hardware aids for computer access for the blind and visually impaired. They have screen readers, speech synthesizers, and braille translators, among other things, described on their web site. Their HAL screen reader is gaining in popularity worldwide.

Duxbury Systems

Duxbury Systems is a company noted for its Duxbury braille translation software. Their web site includes information on Duxbury-related Internet mailing lists for keeping in touch with the latest developments at the company. In 1999 Duxbury Systems merged with Braille Planet, makers of products such as MegaDots. The Duxbury Systems web site now includes information on both the traditional Duxbury Systems products and those acquired from Braille Planet.

EconoNet International

EconoNet International is a company whose main business is providing web site hosting services. However, they have also introduced a series of inexpensive windows applications which are both speech friendly and speech enabled. In other words, their software will work both as stand-alone talking applications or in conjunction with screen readers. They also sell an inexpensive Windows screen reader that works with many of the most popular programs on the market.

Emacspeak

Emacspeak, written by T.V. Raman, is a free-of-charge add-in to the popular Emacs editor for the Unix operating system. Emacspeak provides a complete "audio interface" for Unix.

En-Vision America

En-vision America in Normal, Illinois markets a device that permits associating a digitally recorded voice message with a bar code on a package. Once a voice message has been recorded for a given bar code, a blind user can run a bar code scanner over a package to identify the contents.

Enabling Technologies

Enabling Technologies is one of the world's major producers of braille embossers.

Enhanced Vision Systems

Enhanced Vision Systems is a southern California company specializing in low-vision products such as closed circuit TV's and compact magnifiers.

Eschenbach Optic of America

Eschenbach Optic of America is the American sales arm of Eschenbach of Germany. Eschenbach has been making magnifying aids for over eighty years. Their mission is to be the comprehensive resource for low vision rehabilitation; for both the eye care provider and the visually
impaired.

F.H. Papenmeier

F.H. Papenmeier is a German electronics company which has manufactured refreshable braille displays since 1975. They also develop screen access software for people who are blind or have low vision.

Freedom Scientific

Freedom Scientific is a company formed from the merger of the former Arkenstone, Blazie Engineering, and Henter-Joyce, three major suppliers for the visually impaired. The merged company produces a wide variety of software and hardware products including screen readers, braille embossers, refreshable braille displays, page scanning packages, and screen magnification software. Freedom Scientific's Blazie division will do servicing on the Optacon, the tactile reading device for the blind formerly sold by Telesensory, Inc. However, research into production of a new Optacon-style device has ceased at Freedom Scientific. Other efforts toward developing a new Optacon continue at other research sites. For information on how to stay up-to-date on Optacon research, click here

Frontier Computing

Frontier Computing is a leading distributor of access technology in Canada.

FutureForms

FutureForms sells braille paper.

GW Micro

GW Micro is a firm specializing in screen readers for the IBM PC. They are famous for the Vocal-Eyes screen reader for DOS and the Window-Eyes package for Microsoft Windows. The web site includes a link to GW Micro's FTP site for downloading files.

Haptic Technologies

Haptic Technologies of Montreal, Quebec, Canada is a technology licensing company which develops and markets haptic hardware and software technologies that stimulate the sense of touch using high fidelity force feedback. They are engaged in research that should allow a blind person to "feel" and interact with a virtual computer screen without the need for an expensive full-page tactile graphics display.

HotBraille

HotBraille is a free service that permits users to submit plain text letters over the web for translation into grade II braille and mailing to their recipients. This can permit a person who does not know braille to mail a braille letter. The site also features a variety of braille-related resources.

Humanware

Humanware produces and distributes a wide variety of products for the visually impaired.

IBM Accessibility Center

IBM Corporation Human Ability and Accessibility Center has links for downloading demonstration versions of some products.

Independent Living Aids

Independent Living Aids is the oldest, privately held, national mail-order distributor of aids to daily living for the blind and visually impaired in the United States. They are now in their twenty-first year of doing business and their fourth year as the Royal National Institute for the Blind's importer and distributor in the United States.

Index Braille

Index Braille in Gammelstad, Sweden is one of the world's leading manufacturers of braille embossers. They have been in business since 1982.

Ion Systems

Ion Systems is a company that produces products for on-screen publishing. They feel that their publishing process can aid in the presentation of web content for low vision users. Click here for their low vision demo page This demo relies heavily on Java and other technologies that may be inaccessible to users of screen readers, so blind users may have trouble with the page.

JBliss Imaging Systems

JBliss Imaging Systems was founded by James Bliss, one of the major people behind the development of the Optacon. JBliss Imaging Systems is dedicated to providing access to information for persons with a visual impairment through PC-based solutions.

Kurzweil Educational Systems

Kurzweil Educational Systems is a leading supplier of print reading software for the blind and others who have problems reading standard print. Kurzweil Educational Systems produces Kurzweil 1000 optical character recognition software for the visually impaired and the Kurzweil 3000 system for people with learning disabilities.

Magnisight

Magnisight is a manufacturer of closed circuit television systems. One of their feature items is a system that uses a standard television set for the monitor.

Maxi-Aids

Maxi-Aids is one of the largest distributors of products for people with Special Needs. They have several thousand products for daily living, from Sewing needles to Voice Recognition Computer products.

Microcomputer Science Centre

Microcomputer Science Centre Inc of Toronto, Ontario, Canada has been devoted to creating computer solutions for people with special needs since 1980. They have their own lab for assessing the needs of prospective clients. They also have web-based catalogs of products grouped by disability.

Microsoft Accessibility

Microsoft Accessibility includes information on accessibility features of Microsoft Windows and other Microsoft products. The site also presents recommendations for creating programs accessible to people with a wide variety of disabilities.

Robotron

Robotron is an Australian company famous for the Eureka A4, several optical character recognition machines, palmtop braille and talking computers, and so on.

Sensus

Sensus is a Danish consultancy organisation chartered with the development of computerized tools and electronic publications for the blind and partially sighted. They offer a number of products and services including a talking web browser.

Shadows in the Dark

Shadows in the Dark sells a range of Braille greeting cards for several occasions and cards in languages other than English.

Sighted Electronics

Sighted Electronics in Austin, Texas is a dealer for closed circuit television systems, braille embossers, and other technology items for the visually impaired.

Techno-Vision Systems

Techno-Vision Systems is one of the leading specialists in the supply of equipment and systems for visually impaired people in Great Britain.

Technologies for the Visually Impaired

Technologies for the Visually Impaired is a dealer for a wide variety of adaptive devices and software ranging from adapted computers to screen magnification software to reading machines.

Telesensory

Telesensory is probably best known for its development of the Optacon, a tactile reading device for the blind. TeleSensory has ceased production of the Optacon. Click here for information on efforts to develop a replacement device for the Optacon TeleSensory has several products for people who are partially sighted or blind.

textHELP Systems

textHELP Systems is a company that specializes in various computer products for persons with disabilities. They have a screen reader product that they intend primarily for people with dyslexia and related perceptual difficulties. They have other products as well, mostly intended to assist people with physical disabilities.

Vision Technology Inc.

Vision Technology manufactures reading systems for people with low vision.

Voice Diary

Voice Diary Inc manufactures a full-featured portable personal data assistant that stores spoken-word information in its internal computer memory.