[bcg27]

Thanks for the translation arnaud. I think the letter did it's job, after reading that I feel a lot better about the future of stax. I guess it remains to be seen how things actually turn out though.

 

[kiteki]

They have some tricks up their sleeve everything will be fine now.
 
 

 

[Edoardo]

I still don't get why Stax has always produced just headphones and if Edifier is going to make Stax take advantage of their potential economies of scope - which would mean electrostatic microphones, speaker drivers, and even preamps, power amps or whatever they can translate the technology they've always owned into.

 

[Blue Boat]

Stopped reading at page 8.
 
Wonder why Stax decided to let go of the company to a Chinese company. China and Japan aren't exactly good buddies and they could've sold it for a lot more to other audio companies. Yamaha maybe? Stax Yamahas :0

 

[Elysian]

Quote:

Lately, the people making good money in China are supporting the luxury businesses of the wolrd. This class of people actually WANT to pay a lot of money for gear that MUST be manufactured outside of China (like Japan, US, Germany...). This category of customers will not care for chinese made half price earspeakers. So again, I wonder which market Edifier is targeting? Maybe worldwide audiophile market who's not quite ready to pay Stax prices for es gear?

Yup, a lot of people don't realize that it's China (and to a lesser extent, Europe) that's propping up the luxury goods market, and that certainly also goes for audio.  Hate to say it, but I doubt Edifier or Stax cares much about what the odd US Stax 007/009 buyer cares, as long as we don't generate negative PR for them.  If Stax did care, we would've had better than Yama's a long time ago.  I've never used Yama's, but the years of negative feedback, and US owners shipping their headphones to the UK and Japan for repair, speak for itself.
 
Some Chinese audio companies have done well by getting the Japanese audiophile seal of approval, and this will be an interesting pairing going forward.
 
This is probably good for electrostat R&D in the long-run, as it's Chinese consumers with the discretionary income to fund purchases of 009s, 007s, and 507s, and hopefully Stax can broaden its base with Edifier's international distribution, marketing, and sales expertise.

 

[Anaxilus]

Quote:

Stopped reading at page 8.
 
Wonder why Stax decided to let go of the company to a Chinese company. China and Japan aren't exactly good buddies and they could've sold it for a lot more to other audio companies. Yamaha maybe? Stax Yamahas :0

Money doesn't care what country you are from, only people do.  
 
As for Senn buying Stax, heh, I'm pretty sure if they wanted to make a 009 or better they'd make it on their own.  Once again, it's about the monies.
 
People seem to be under the impression that buying Stax out is somehow an obvious and beneficial business decision to make.  I'd be inclined to side w/ those that don't.  Regardless, that doesn't seem to be what's really happened here.

 

[NamelessPFG]

 
Quote:

I still don't get why Stax has always produced just headphones

Not true at all. They've made phono cartridges, speaker amps, and even ESLs (which are presumably best paired with those monoblock amps of theirs) in the past, to name a few things.
 
But they presumably dropped all of that after the bankruptcy and reformation to focus on their bread and butter, probably to make it easier on the bottom line. After all, to the few people who even know the Stax name, it largely means electrostatic headphones.

 

[Elysian]

Quote:

People seem to be under the impression that buying Stax out is somehow an obvious and beneficial business decision to make.  I'd be inclined to side w/ those that don't.  Regardless, that doesn't seem to be what's really happened here.

My cynical side tells me that this is another Chinese trophy purchase for founders who are awash in capital and appreciate the company's heritage.  I'm sure a more accurate picture will come out over the next few years.
 
I still don't understand why there's this impression that Stax has some amazing R&D.
 
Like earlier posters have said, all signs point to Stax having a poor balance sheet for growth (much less just getting by day-to-day in this lousy economy, and as bad as the US and EU looks, JP is even worse).  Stax doesn't seem to make interesting amps anymore, and they're going nowhere fast if it takes several years to iterate on a single product.
 
I wonder if Stax's engineers have an expensive pension plan in place, when they revived the company.  I'm unfamiliar with Japanese law (I don't even know if Japanese companies need to be owned at least 51% by a Japanese citizen), but maybe this is a way to also remove specific structural impediments to growth.
 
Just idle speculation on my part.  If you're not familiar with business, please don't go into kneejerk mode and read too much into the comments above.

 

[David1961]

With regards to what might happen with Stax in the future, or anything else for that matter, like one of Mike Oldfields songs [ Only Time Will Tell ]

 

[KANA]

Do you guys read the new press release of Edifier ?
 
http://www.edifier.com/sce2009/news/viewthread.php?ID=1542

 

[arnaud]

Quote:

Stopped reading at page 8.
 
Wonder why Stax decided to let go of the company to a Chinese company. China and Japan aren't exactly good buddies and they could've sold it for a lot more to other audio companies. Yamaha maybe? Stax Yamahas :0

There are answers in pages 9-18

 

[googleli]

In the new article the chairman of Edifier said there will be a new brand for cheaper electrostats made in China, and he said the new brand will NOT be called Stax.  All Stax staff in Japan will be kept including the Stax chairman and they will inject more money and their industrial expertise into Stax. It wil also "provide Stax with its global sales channels to provide better service". "Stax will still be operating independently and research and manufacturing will remain 100% in Japan." And at the end of this new announcement he says, as you can probably read since these are the only words in English in the article, "Stax is still Stax".

 

[DigitalFreak]

Quote:

 
Okay now the $1.5M figure makes sense, this is a joint venture for the future development of both companies, nothing to do with selling off Stax at all.
 

So they just partnered up and Edifer won't be gutting out STAX's intellectual property for it's own projects? Rather weird considering in the beginning Edifer was getting 100% of STAX's stocks. Now I'm wondering if Edifer isn't just going to slowly scale down STAX piece by piece instead of closing it all and sending it off to some plant in Shenzhen.

 

[brobilly]

Quote:

So they just partnered up and Edifer won't be gutting out STAX's intellectual property for it's own projects? Rather weird considering in the beginning Edifer was getting 100% of STAX's stocks. Now I'm wondering if Edifer isn't just going to slowly scale down STAX piece by piece instead of closing it all and sending it off to some plant in Shenzhen.

in the Edifier's official website, it said it is a full acquisition. Edifier is Stax's mother company

 

[Elysian]

Quote:

In the new article the chairman of Edifier said there will be a new brand for cheaper electrostats made in China, and he said the new brand will NOT be called Stax.  All Stax staff in Japan will be kept including the Stax chairman and they will inject more money and their industrial expertise into Stax. It wil also "provide Stax with its global sales channels to provide better service". "Stax will still be operating independently and research and manufacturing will remain 100% in Japan." And at the end of this new announcement he says, as you can probably read since these are the only words in English in the article, "Stax is still Stax".

Great update, thank you.