Loggerhead Instruments
Loggerhead Instruments designs and sells Haikubox, a Wi-Fi-enabled outdoor device that uses a proprietary neural network to identify over 6,000 bird species (and North American bats) from their vocalizations, serving hobbyist birders, classrooms, and citizen scientists via D2C, retail partners, and a Cornell Lab research partnership.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2003
- HeadquartersSarasota, United States
- Headcount1–10
- GTM typeB2C
- OfferingHardware or Manufacturing
What Loggerhead Instruments does
Loggerhead Instruments, Inc. is a privately-held Florida-based company founded in 2003 that originally developed and manufactured underwater acoustics equipment for oceanographers and has since pivoted to consumer bioacoustics through its Haikubox product line, launched commercially in 2017-2020 in partnership with the K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. The company's core product is the Haikubox, a Wi-Fi-enabled, weather-resistant outdoor plug-in device (2.5 x 6 x 1.5 inches) that passively records bird vocalizations 24/7 and identifies over 6,000 species using a proprietary neural network trained on thousands of labeled sound recordings; a 2025 product variant, the Chirp-E, extends identification to North American bat echolocation calls. Supporting the hardware are a freemium cloud software tier, a $59/year Haikubox+ subscription unlocking alerts, life lists, 30-day history and data exports, and the Haikubox Listen web and mobile applications for spectrogram review and community-science contribution.
Haikubox makes money primarily through one-time hardware sales ($269 birdsong-only, $299 bird-and-bat), bundled with a first-year Haikubox+ subscription that auto-renews, plus a recurring $59/year subscription stream and modest out-of-warranty repair services ($39 repair or $99 replacement). Its go-to-market combines direct-to-consumer e-commerce on haikubox.com, a self-serve PLG-style onboarding flow via the Haikubox Connect iOS/Android app, dense physical retail through 40+ Wild Birds Unlimited franchise stores and independent birding shops in the US, and a growing network of European specialist retailers spanning 16+ countries.
The company serves hobbyist birders, citizen scientists, classroom educators, and small specialty hospitality accounts (e.g., birding-focused Airbnbs), while also generating research-grade bioacoustic data that feeds peer-reviewed studies with Cornell Lab, including a 2025 Scientific Reports paper on the 2024 total solar eclipse. Operating with 1-10 employees and approximately $1.52 million in cumulative non-dilutive NSF SBIR/STTR funding, Loggerhead has been recognized as a TIME Best Invention of 2024 and continues to expand its retail footprint, species coverage, and feature surface across 2024-2025.
Loggerhead Instruments firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Loggerhead Instruments
- Legal name
- Loggerhead Instruments, Inc.
- Website
- https://haikubox.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2003
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 1–10 employees
- Short description
- Loggerhead Instruments designs and sells Haikubox, a Wi-Fi-enabled outdoor device that uses a proprietary neural network to identify over 6,000 bird species (and North American bats) from their vocalizations, serving hobbyist birders, classrooms, and citizen scientists via D2C, retail partners, and a Cornell Lab research partnership.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Loggerhead Instruments industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Consumer Bioacoustic Monitoring Hardware
- NAICS
- Exterminating and Pest Control Services (56171)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Acoustic Deterrents (Sonic/Ultrasonic Devices, Distress Calls) (HSAMAGAJ)
- akta.pro secondary industry
- Revenue Cycle, Payments & Financing (Payments, Subscriptions, BNPL, Claims Support) (HLAMAGAE)
Keywords
Where Loggerhead Instruments is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Sarasota
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Offices2 records
Markets served
Loggerhead Instruments business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2C
- Offering type
- Hardware or Manufacturing
- Cost components
- Supply Chain, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Personnel, Infrastructure, Operations
Revenue model
- Hardware Sales: One-time purchase of the Haikubox device ($269 for the birdsong-only model, $299 for the bird-and-bat Chirp-E model), bundled with a one-year Haikubox+ subscription. Designed and hand-built in the United States with high-quality components.
- Haikubox+ Annual Subscription: Recurring $59/year membership unlocks premium features (species notifications, new bird alerts, photo uploads, live page, favorites, life list, 30 days of recordings). Auto-renews after the bundled first year unless downgraded to the free tier.
- Freemium Software Tier: Free tier included with every Haikubox provides the proprietary neural net, identification of any of 6,000+ species, and the past 24 hours of detections — upsell path to the paid subscription.
- Out-of-Warranty Repair & Replacement Services: Post-warranty repair service for $39, or $99 hardware replacement with membership transfer when a repair is not possible.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Unit Pricing | One-time + Annual subscription | Haikubox: 24/7 Birdsong Identifier — device with one-year Haikubox+ subscription |
| Unit Pricing | One-time + Annual subscription | Haikubox 24/7 Bird & Bat Identifier (Chirp-E) — device with one-year Haikubox+ subscription |
| Subscription | Annual | Haikubox+ Annual Membership (post first year) |
| Freemium | Pay-as-you-go | Free tier included with every Haikubox |
Go-to-market motion3 records
Distribution channels6 records
Marketing channels8 records
Loggerhead Instruments product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Loggerhead Instruments designs, manufactures, and sells the Haikubox — a Wi-Fi-enabled, plug-in outdoor device that passively listens 24/7 and uses a proprietary neural network to identify more than 6,000 bird species (and, on the Chirp-E variant, North American bat species by echolocation) and push real-time alerts to a companion app and website. Hardware ($269 birdsong model; $299 bird-and-bat model) is bundled with a one-year Haikubox+ subscription ($59/year thereafter) that unlocks species notifications, life lists, audio/CSV downloads, and community-science data sharing with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
Product overview
Loggerhead Instruments offers Haikubox, an AI-powered bioacoustic bird and bat identification platform built around a plug-in outdoor device. The hardware portfolio consists of two variants — the Haikubox: 24/7 Birdsong Identifier ($269) for bird-only detection and the Haikubox 24/7 Bird & Bat Identifier ($299), which adds bat echolocation identification through partnerships with Bat Conservation International and NABat. Supporting the hardware are the Haikubox+ premium subscription ($59/year) with a free tier, the Haikubox Listen web platform at listen.haikubox.com, the Haikubox mobile app for iOS and Android, and the Haikubox Connect setup app. Both device variants are designed and assembled in the USA and rely on a proprietary neural network trained on thousands of labeled bird (and bat) recordings to identify species in real time, contributing observations to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics for community science research.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Products and services
- Haikubox: 24/7 Birdsong Identifier Plug-in, Wi-Fi-enabled outdoor device (2.5 x 6 x 1.5 inches, 11-foot power cord for a standard 110V outdoor GFCI outlet) that passively listens for and identifies more than 6,000 bird species in real time using a proprietary neural network. Bundled with a one-year Haikubox+ subscription; designed and assembled in the United States. Sold in the U.S. and Canada (including Hawaii and Puerto Rico) at $269 USD.
- Haikubox 24/7 Bird & Bat Identifier (Chirp-E) Extended version of the Haikubox hardware that, in addition to identifying over 6,000 bird species, identifies North American bat species by their echolocation calls via partnerships with Bat Conservation International and the North American Bat Monitoring Program (NABat). Includes a one-year Haikubox+ subscription. Priced at $299 USD; sold in the United States including Hawaii and Puerto Rico.
- Haikubox+ subscription Premium subscription tier priced at $59/year that auto-renews after the bundled first year and can be downgraded to a free tier with limited functionality. Unlocks species notifications, new bird alerts, user photo uploads, shareable bird feed links, live identification pages, favorites, life lists, and access to 30 days of historical recordings.
- Haikubox Listen web platform and companion mobile apps Web application at listen.haikubox.com and companion iOS/Android apps where users view identified birds, listen to recordings, see spectrograms, set alerts, manage their subscription, download data as CSV or .wav files, and contribute observations to the community science network. The Haikubox Connect app handles initial Wi-Fi setup.
- Out-of-warranty repair and replacement service Post-warranty repair service priced at $39 per device, or full hardware replacement at $99 with membership transfer to the replacement unit when a repair is not possible.
Quantifiable outcome
- Identifies 6,000+ bird species globally
- +4 more outcomes
Companies that use Loggerhead Instruments
Customer profileNamed customers4 records
Ideal customer profiles4 records
Loggerhead Instruments technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- No
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration3 records
AI capability7 records
Feature6 records
Loggerhead Instruments partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
13 partnerships are on record, tiered flagship, core and minor.
- K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics, Cornell Lab of OrnithologyflagshipResearch partnership in which every Haikubox owner can contribute data to the Cornell Lab for bioacoustic research. Co-authors from the Center (Stefan Kahl and Holger Klinck) collaborated on the 2024 eclipse study published in Scientific Reports. The Center is led by Holger Klinck, PhD, who co-developed Haikubox with founder David Mann.
- Bat Conservation InternationalcorePartnership to identify North American bat species via their echolocation calls in the Chirp-E device; customer purchases contribute to scientific understanding of bats.
- North American Bat Monitoring Program (NABat)coreCollaboration that enables the Haikubox to identify individual North American bat species from their echolocation calls; supports ongoing bat monitoring research.
- Wild Birds Unlimited (franchise retail network, US)flagship40+ listed Wild Birds Unlimited franchise locations carry Haikubox, including prominent stores in California, Texas, Florida, New York (including the location at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca), and across the Midwest and Southeast.
- Los Gatos BirdwatcherminorIndependent California retailer (792 Blossom Hill Road, Los Gatos) listed as a participating Haikubox retailer.
- The Bird House NYminorIndependent New York retailer (3035 Monroe Avenue, Rochester) carrying Haikubox.
- Natur og FritidminorRetailer serving Norway and Sweden; online shop lists Haikubox for automatic bird sound recording.
- NaturbutikkenminorRetailer covering Denmark and Greenland carrying Haikubox.
- VogelskijkenminorDutch webshop serving Belgium and the Netherlands; lists Haikubox in its catalogue.
- Veldshop.nlminorEuropean online retailer covering Austria, Belgium, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Germany and Switzerland.
- WildlifeCam UKminorUK-based retailer selling Haikubox under the 'bird call identifier and bird song recognition' product name.
- NHBS (Natural History Book Service)minorUK retailer of natural-history products carrying Haikubox.
- Pacific University (referenced via female birdsong research)minorReferenced in a Haikubox blog post discussing why female birds of some species may sing; cited as a research source rather than a formal commercial partner.
Scale indicators8 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights6 records
Loggerhead Instruments competitors and assessment
Company assessmentBroad incumbents
- Wildlife Acoustics: Established maker of professional SongMeter and Echo Meter passive acoustic monitoring hardware used by researchers worldwide. It targets the scientific/professional market that Haikubox's research-grade data positions itself to enter, and is the de facto incumbent in bioacoustic field hardware.
- Swarovski Optik: Premium birding-optics brand with a DTC and specialty-retail channel into the same backyard-birder customer. It serves as the high-end incumbent for the Haikubox target demographic and a potential retail or bundling partner.
Others
- eBird (Cornell Lab of Ornithology): The world's largest citizen-science bird observation database, run by the same Cornell Lab that partners with Haikubox. It is the data ecosystem into which Haikubox observations flow, and a channel for community-science acquisition.
- Shazam (Apple): Apple-owned audio fingerprinting service that popularized 'Shazam for birds' as the consumer mental model for Haikubox. It represents the platform-scale audio-ID technology incumbent that smart-home platforms could leverage to compete directly with Haikubox.
- Cornell Lab K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics: Cornell Lab research center co-developing Haikubox's neural network with founder David Mann. It is a strategic partner rather than a competitor, but it houses the research-grade bioacoustics programs (including BirdNET) that anchor the technology landscape Haikubox operates in.
Direct peers
- Merlin Bird ID (Cornell Lab of Ornithology): Cornell Lab's free smartphone app for AI-based bird identification by sound and photo. It is the most direct competitor to Haikubox for the consumer birder use case, and notably is published by the same institution that partners with Haikubox.
- BirdNET: Cornell Lab and Chemnitz University of Technology's open-source AI bird-sound identification engine. It is the open-source analogue to Haikubox's proprietary neural net and powers many academic and hobbyist acoustic-monitoring projects.
- Bird Buddy: AI-powered smart bird feeder with camera and species-ID notifications, sold DTC to backyard birders. It is the closest direct competitor in the consumer hardware + subscription + AI bird-ID category, even though it uses video rather than acoustic identification.
Emerging players
- iNaturalist: Joint California Academy of Sciences / National Geographic citizen-science platform that uses AI to identify plants, animals, and fungi from photos and (increasingly) sounds. It is a comparable citizen-science network and AI identification layer, broader than Haikubox but overlapping in mission and community.
- AudioMoth (Open Acoustic Devices): Low-cost, open-source acoustic recording device widely used by ecologists and citizen scientists for bioacoustic monitoring. Comparable to Haikubox in use case but without a built-in species-ID neural network, making it a complementary or DIY alternative.
Market position
Strengths5 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat5 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
Loggerhead Instruments social profiles
Digital presenceLoggerhead Instruments financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Loggerhead Instruments leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles1 record
Loggerhead Instruments funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds3 records
Investors1 record
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Loggerhead Instruments M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Loggerhead Instruments
What does Loggerhead Instruments do?
Loggerhead Instruments designs, manufactures, and sells the Haikubox — a Wi-Fi-enabled, plug-in outdoor device that passively listens 24/7 and uses a proprietary neural network to identify more than 6,000 bird species (and, on the Chirp-E variant, North American bat species by echolocation) and push real-time alerts to a companion app and website. Hardware ($269 birdsong model; $299 bird-and-bat model) is bundled with a one-year Haikubox+ subscription ($59/year thereafter) that unlocks species notifications, life lists, audio/CSV downloads, and community-science data sharing with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
Is Loggerhead Instruments a public or private company?
Loggerhead Instruments is a private company. It is classified as founder individual operated bootstrapped and is currently operating.
When was Loggerhead Instruments founded?
Loggerhead Instruments was founded in 2003. It employs 1 to 10 people.
Where is Loggerhead Instruments based?
Loggerhead Instruments is headquartered in Sarasota, United States, in the North America region.
How does Loggerhead Instruments make money?
Four revenue lines are on record. Hardware Sales are the primary driver. The others are haikubox+ Annual Subscription, freemium Software Tier and out-of-Warranty Repair & Replacement Services.
Who are Loggerhead Instruments's main competitors?
Broad incumbents on record are Wildlife Acoustics and Swarovski Optik. Others are eBird (Cornell Lab of Ornithology), Shazam (Apple) and Cornell Lab K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics. Direct peers are Merlin Bird ID (Cornell Lab of Ornithology), BirdNET and Bird Buddy. Emerging players are iNaturalist and AudioMoth (Open Acoustic Devices).
Does Loggerhead Instruments have an API?
No public API is recorded for Loggerhead Instruments.
What industry is Loggerhead Instruments in?
Loggerhead Instruments's product category is Consumer Bioacoustic Monitoring Hardware. Its primary akta.pro industry code is HSAMAGAJ, Acoustic Deterrents (Sonic/Ultrasonic Devices, Distress Calls), with a secondary code of HLAMAGAE, Revenue Cycle, Payments & Financing (Payments, Subscriptions, BNPL, Claims Support). Its NAICS code is 56171.