nraymond
500+ Head-Fier
I was doing some personal research on Philips/WOOX/Gibson/Onkyo and was trying to understand their relationships, and came across this bit of news from a few months ago:
https://www.thestreet.com/story/142...ault-if-company-can-t-refinance-its-debt.html
and then there was this:
http://variety.com/2017/music/news/gibson-guitars-memphis-factory-for-sale-1202595684/
and then this:
https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/blog/2017/11/21/2017-11-21-breaking-news-gibson-kills-cakewalk
In 2014 Philips sold their WOOX Innovations division (audio, video, multimedia, and accessories) to Gibson. And then Gibson has been on a buying spree, acquiring controlling interests in a constellation of companies:
https://www.strata-gee.com/gibson-brands-control-onkyo/
So Gibson is in a controlling position of a lot of brands - Philips, TEAC, Onkyo, Pioneer, Cerwin Vega, Stanton, KRK Systems, Baldwin Piano... and their debt situation is not good. The factory closure and killing Cakewalk may just be the start. I am a personally fan of a number of the recent Philips (Fidelio L2) and Onkyo (ES-FC300, H900M, E700M) headphones and I would be sad if the parent company ends up in serious trouble.
I am concerned that a lot of these brands and products aren't in the consumer spaces where a lot of attention from other companies and interest from a lot of consumers is right now. In terms of home theater and personal audio, there's a lot of attention on tech companies and their solutions. Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri, Google Assistant, Microsoft Cortana, Samsung Bixby, and there's been some uptake from people in terms of buying audio and video products that integrate into those ecosystems over more traditional solutions. Sonos made quite a bit of headway into a lot of people's homes with their wireless multiroom speaker solutions, but had some of their marketshare taken over by lower quality speakers with integrated voice assistants, and now Sonos is playing catch-up on integration, recently letting Amazon devices control the Sonos system via voice, and they launched their own single speaker product (Sonos One) to compete in that space that works with Alexa now and will support Siri, AirPlay 2, and Google Assistant in 2018. The combination of solutions like this and things like TV soundbars (which now extend in terms of their scope all the way up to Dolby Atmos solutions) have eroded the traditional home theater where a lot of the constellation of Gibson brands rests.
I get the impression that the average consumer has more interest in a product that conveniently integrates into that ecosystem rather than one that emphasizes quality, and in that regard I think WOOX/Gibson Innovations have had some mis-steps. The Philips Fidelio M2L was the first Lightning connector headphone on the market, but it strangely lacked a mic. And wireless headphones are clearly a growing segment of the market, and I haven't seen a lot happening from Gibson Innovations and their brands in that space. We've already seen some major upheaval in the home theater sector with TV makers and a number of brands collapsing, divisions being sold off, etc. Samsung just completed an $8 billion acquisition of Harman (which includes Harman Kardon, Becker, JBL, Crown Audio, dbx, DigiTech, Martin Professional, AKG Acoustics, Lexicon, Infinity, Mark Levinson, Revel).
I really hope Gibson can turn things around (though it's unclear to me what would happen to a lot of these brands if Gibson runs into more serious financial difficulty, since in many cases they are a controlling shareholder or handle a branded division (like Philips' audio, video, multimedia, and accessories), but are not the outright owner of these other brands). How do folks think this will play out?
https://www.thestreet.com/story/142...ault-if-company-can-t-refinance-its-debt.html
and then there was this:
http://variety.com/2017/music/news/gibson-guitars-memphis-factory-for-sale-1202595684/
and then this:
https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/blog/2017/11/21/2017-11-21-breaking-news-gibson-kills-cakewalk
In 2014 Philips sold their WOOX Innovations division (audio, video, multimedia, and accessories) to Gibson. And then Gibson has been on a buying spree, acquiring controlling interests in a constellation of companies:
https://www.strata-gee.com/gibson-brands-control-onkyo/
So Gibson is in a controlling position of a lot of brands - Philips, TEAC, Onkyo, Pioneer, Cerwin Vega, Stanton, KRK Systems, Baldwin Piano... and their debt situation is not good. The factory closure and killing Cakewalk may just be the start. I am a personally fan of a number of the recent Philips (Fidelio L2) and Onkyo (ES-FC300, H900M, E700M) headphones and I would be sad if the parent company ends up in serious trouble.
I am concerned that a lot of these brands and products aren't in the consumer spaces where a lot of attention from other companies and interest from a lot of consumers is right now. In terms of home theater and personal audio, there's a lot of attention on tech companies and their solutions. Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri, Google Assistant, Microsoft Cortana, Samsung Bixby, and there's been some uptake from people in terms of buying audio and video products that integrate into those ecosystems over more traditional solutions. Sonos made quite a bit of headway into a lot of people's homes with their wireless multiroom speaker solutions, but had some of their marketshare taken over by lower quality speakers with integrated voice assistants, and now Sonos is playing catch-up on integration, recently letting Amazon devices control the Sonos system via voice, and they launched their own single speaker product (Sonos One) to compete in that space that works with Alexa now and will support Siri, AirPlay 2, and Google Assistant in 2018. The combination of solutions like this and things like TV soundbars (which now extend in terms of their scope all the way up to Dolby Atmos solutions) have eroded the traditional home theater where a lot of the constellation of Gibson brands rests.
I get the impression that the average consumer has more interest in a product that conveniently integrates into that ecosystem rather than one that emphasizes quality, and in that regard I think WOOX/Gibson Innovations have had some mis-steps. The Philips Fidelio M2L was the first Lightning connector headphone on the market, but it strangely lacked a mic. And wireless headphones are clearly a growing segment of the market, and I haven't seen a lot happening from Gibson Innovations and their brands in that space. We've already seen some major upheaval in the home theater sector with TV makers and a number of brands collapsing, divisions being sold off, etc. Samsung just completed an $8 billion acquisition of Harman (which includes Harman Kardon, Becker, JBL, Crown Audio, dbx, DigiTech, Martin Professional, AKG Acoustics, Lexicon, Infinity, Mark Levinson, Revel).
I really hope Gibson can turn things around (though it's unclear to me what would happen to a lot of these brands if Gibson runs into more serious financial difficulty, since in many cases they are a controlling shareholder or handle a branded division (like Philips' audio, video, multimedia, and accessories), but are not the outright owner of these other brands). How do folks think this will play out?
