[wordfool]

  Drivers are more efficient these days and the amount of tuning it takes to make that happen i'm sure takes more time and effort

More time and effort than it used to, but with the right gear and a couple good engineers I suspect we're talking months at most, not years. Everything seems to be modeled using computers these days, which has sped up development of all sorts of gear, from electronics to camera lenses. Gone are the days of manually tweaking something, testing, repeating. 

 

[Whitigir]

More time and effort than it used to, but with the right gear and a couple good engineers I suspect we're talking months at most, not years. Everything seems to be modeled using computers these days, which has sped up development of all sorts of gear, from electronics to camera lenses. Gone are the days of manually tweaking something, testing, repeating. 

Bravo ! At last, there are people who knows their stuff

 

[p4s2p0]

  Gone are the days of manually tweaking something, testing, repeating. 

Sound engineers still have to use their ears as they are tuning though tech does help in some aspects like design and production but that doesn't necessarily speed things up by alot.

 

[Whitigir]

Not true when sound engineers still have to use their ears as they are tuning

Are you saying people don't have to use their ears to tune Portable player such as AK380 in development ? How about TV ? Should TV be costing $40,000 nowadays ? The point is that when everything is considered, to develop a headphones is easier than to develop a player, Amplifier. So if headphones goes up to 4K and furthermore 50k ? A player and a TV shall be 40k or 500k

Hell, let me tell you a secret...DIY amplifier are even better than those manufactured by big Brands. You think people don't spend time and money in R&D ? Ridiculous. It is just because these are using "ancient technology and principles", it is like copying original sketch into an alternative of the same one just like drawing a Cartoon character and his movements.

 

[p4s2p0]

How about TV ? Should TV be costing $40,000 nowadays ?

There are tv's that cost more than than that so I guess that is up to the consumer buying such tech

 

[wordfool]

  Sound engineers still have to use their ears as they are tuning though tech does help in some aspects like design and prodcution.

 
I'm not a sound engineer, but I suspect much of the tuning is done to a specific FR curve without input of human ears, creating a handful of prototypes with subtle variations. Then the human ears (probably involving engineers and focus groups) have final say over which one, or combination of several, sounds best. 
 
I'd actually love to hear from anyone at a headphone manufacturer about how a new set of cans is created from beginning to end. No doubt it's a very complicated business process involving market research, costing, marketing, modeling, tuning etc, but I find it hard to imagine a company like Beyerdynamic takes years to design and build a new headphone model. They probably have a whole series of release dates factored in to their 1, 3, 5 year business plans, of which marketing and sourcing/manufacturing probably dominate the process, not design.  
 
In my mind, the key part of the process that seems to be leading to rapidly inflating flagship headphone prices is the market research. Apparently companies have discovered that there are enough people out there willing to pay exorbitant amounts of money for elite headphones, so then they just need their designers and engineers to come up with something that can withstand the marketing hype. 
 
I always seem to come back to comparing headphones with camera lenses. What I've seen happen with camera lenses in the last decade is that as electronics, computer modeling, and lens manufacturing processes got better, companies like Canon and Nikon have been able to rapidly design and prototype lenses with performance far surpassing those from previous generations. The prices of this new generation of lenses ballooned, perhaps because the much better performance allowed companies to get away with charging more. I dunno, but compare, say, Canon's 24-70L v1 and v2 lenses and the price difference is huge.  

 

[ruhenheiM]

  Sounds about right I started using headphones around 1985.
 
Marketing is apart of business but if product fails to meet consumer expectations not even marketing can save it.

 
if you already gained the market.you don't have to. sometimes they will follow. and of course there's always new customers
 
 
with the pricing. its all comes down to the value.how much people willing to pay for this while its still profitable.
its still a hobby. its niche market.you could argue a lot of people using headphone right now.true. but how many great sounding headphone. and with less people using that,the market become more segmented.it's always like that. hifi,car, tv, mobile phone,pc,laptop. and that's the mass market products. if its new technology the price always crazy. in headphone, even though its been there for a while. we all could just hoping its trickle down in a few years but i highly doubt it. the technology trickle down( and it's not that new technology either. last time i check it's still the same principle ). but to get the best quality, there always price to pay.the question are is it worth or not and how many options out there( you know if only few players there,it's very easily become monopoly and soon after that,they jack up the price ) unless they all agree to become cartel. then be happy with what you got

 

[p4s2p0]

   
if you already gained the market.you don't have to. sometimes they will follow. and of course there's always new customers

Market shares are't guaranteed to be permanent though.
 
 
Someday another brand could become as or more popular than beats but only time will tell

 

[ruhenheiM]

  Market shares are't guaranteed to be permanent though.
 
 
Someday another brand could become as or more popular than beats but only time will tell

yea.when that happen usually company already filed for bankruptcy. and most of the time if the company already established household brand. there's some company coming buying them and usually keep the brand alive. and when that happen sometimes,it's not the same company anymore
 
hmmm have you ever heard beyerdynamic or akg? they really popular in studio recording. or perhaps sennheiser they quite popular.of course not as popular as beats.but it's getting there

 

[p4s2p0]

  yea.when that happen usually company already filed for bankruptcy. and most of the time if the company already established household brand. there's some company coming buying them and usually keep the brand alive. and when that happen sometimes,it's not the same company anymore
 
hmmm have you ever heard beyerdynamic or akg? they really popular in studio recording. or perhaps sennheiser they quite popular.of course not as popular as beats.but it's getting there

Maybe sometimes but more often than not I still see them in business.
 
A lot of brands are used in studio I have even seen bose and beats used in such a fashion even if they are targeted for consumer use
 
I have heard of those brands but haven't tried them other than senn. I have seen a few people with senn or akg but I see beats jbl or sony much more often.

 

[tienbasse]

 
​Focal spend 4 years into R&D for the Utopia headphones. Since the same engineers worked on their TOTL loudspeakers, they are senior engineers most likely so they earn around $80.000 per year probably if not more. Not sure how big their engineering team is, but let's assume the team consist of 10 senior engineers (their team is probably much bigger), it's $80.000 x 4 x 10 = $3.2 million just for R&D salaries.
 
Let's assume that the entire headphone cost $0 to make (which is not true ofcourse), then Focal needs to sell $3.2 million / $4000 = 800 headphone just to breakeven for the salaries. And considering how difficult it is to make the headphone, they can't let it go for cheap. The real costs are much higher though.

Sorry for breaking your vision of the world (and don't take it personnally), but Focal is a "small" French company, and by the strangest luck, I work in France as well for a large US corporation, as I mentioned.
 
R&D engineers in France, even senior ones, would never ever earn more than 50-60k$, and if you need 10 engineers for a project, that's a huge project!
We design formulations and mechanical devices with teams of 2-4 people with 1-2 engineers and 1-2 technicians at most.
 
As a senior manager with multiple teams, I don't even get this kind of income in France, although my US colleagues are probably in the ballpark you mention.
R&D costs in the US are an exception though, due to hyper-inflated cost of life in certain States (California for instance), and also hyper-inflation of useless expensive VP positions as companies grow larger/lazier/slower. Don't assume it's the case for most smaller companies, where R&D is on a much smaller scale/size.
 
I don't work for Focal though, so I can't be 100% sure, but we're nowhere near the R&D costs you think about. And Focal isn't as big as my company.
Not so many companies can allow years of R&D for a single product, unless you have to do things like long clinical studies at the end of it.

 

[p4s2p0]

   
  Not so many companies can allow years of R&D for a single product, unless you have to do things like long clinical studies at the end of it.

I suppose it depends on the type of work being done and how big the company is
 
Sony said they started working on my ps vita released in 2012 right when they got done making the last psp revision released 2009 first psp released in 2004
 
Video game companys often say it takes them a year or more on big titles.

 

[ruhenheiM]

yeah. because its silicon based. very different type of business. it's rapid evolve and always changing business. that's why you dont see many players in this business. there's no newcomer. it's very different from audio let alone headphone, also its a small company. very big different amount of money involved

 

[p4s2p0]

There are quite a few headphone companys but ya very few get to become popular

 

[ruhenheiM]

  There are quite a few headphone companys but ya very few get to become popular

sorry my bad, maybe i should type it more clear. i was refer it to the company who in silicon based industry. not many players around.usually already the old same players. for headphone.yea there are few. big brand, boutique, and a lot of newcomer. so maybe the amount of money involve in r&d not that big