Sony acquires Audeze

[Matias]

That is an interesting turn of events.

Sony Interactive Entertainment to Acquire Audeze and Launch New Lossless Wireless Audio Products

Sony Interactive Entertainment - the Sony division responsible for the PlayStation products - announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Audeze, the renowned planar magnetic headphone manufacturer, which has been increasingly also recognized in the high-end gaming headphones...

audioxpress.com

"Just spoke to Sankar and he said business as usual for them, with more resources." - Andrew Lissimore

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1694756336863518967

 

[henologist]

It's good news for Sankar and any other Audeze shareholders, but them being bought by the PlayStation arm of Sony in particular is worrying. Recent PlayStation products have been using wireless protocols like PlayStation Link at the expense of Bluetooth (including their Pulse 3D headset and the PlayStation Portal streaming handheld), and that division is also pushing Sony 360 spatial audio at the expense of Atmos, DTS:X, etc., so I'd expect future gaming headsets from Audeze to work within those restrictions, and the audience that's currently buying Audeze headsets would not be happy with losing those features. They'll be fine so long as gaming headsets remain one of the pillars of their business and not their primary revenue source, but who knows how long that'll be the case.

 

[markanini]

Sad.

 

[Zensō]

Man, the audio industry is in turmoil, so many buyouts, mergers, etc. We all know that “business as usual” almost never ends up being accurate. Metrics will undoubtedly need to be met.

 

[Ambient384]

Man, the audio industry is in turmoil, so many buyouts, mergers, etc. We all know that “business as usual” almost never ends up being accurate. Metrics will undoubtedly need to be met.

Meanwhile Grado Labs is the same as has been since 1953 a family run company.

 

[TK750]

That is an interesting turn of events.

Sony Interactive Entertainment to Acquire Audeze and Launch New Lossless Wireless Audio Products

Sony Interactive Entertainment - the Sony division responsible for the PlayStation products - announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Audeze, the renowned planar magnetic headphone manufacturer, which has been increasingly also recognized in the high-end gaming headphones...

audioxpress.com

"Just spoke to Sankar and he said business as usual for them, with more resources." - Andrew Lissimore

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1694756336863518967

Interesting and a bit of a surprise, didn't know they were supplying the drivers for the new Sony headset. Maybe I've been underestimating how big they are/were, they have released a few gaming products recently. As Glen mentioned, the business as usual comment seems fairly meaningless.

 

[Matias]

Audeze gaming headphones must have impressed Sony a lot. Gaming is a billionaire industry, buying Audeze is nothing for them.

 

[TonyJZX]

this one sounds strange to me because its like Porsche buying Lamborghini (yes I know, VAG companies)

Sony are already pretty competant on the headphones front... BUT... if google is anything to go by Audeze apparently had $5 mil. in revenue in 2021... so unless 2022-23 was gargantua Sony probably bought Audeze for like a fraction on what they paid staff to make Gran Turismo 7... ie. paper clip money

Just an FYI... Sony famously paid $33 mil. maybe 15yrs ago to write just the game engine for one of their games... not the entire game, just the framework it runs on.

 

[Somafunk]

Meanwhile Grado Labs is the same as has been since 1953 a family run company.

Im not surprise, they’re perfect if you have age related hearing loss

 

[amirm]

"Just spoke to Sankar and he said business as usual for them, with more resources." - Andrew Lissimore

They will have to wait to see if this happens. 4 out 5 acquisitions in technology fail so the odds are against them on this front.

 

[deprogrammed]

Audeze gaming headphones must have impressed Sony a lot. Gaming is a billionaire industry, buying Audeze is nothing for them.

The gaming industry is bigger than the music and movie industry. Almost 200 billion.

 

[SuicideSquid]

this one sounds strange to me because its like Porsche buying Lamborghini (yes I know, VAG companies)

It's more like General Motors buying Morgan Motor Co.

 

[suttondesign]

Man, the audio industry is in turmoil, so many buyouts, mergers, etc. We all know that “business as usual” almost never ends up being accurate. Metrics will undoubtedly need to be met.

forever in turmoil, from the beginning

 

[ta240]

"Just spoke to Sankar and he said business as usual for them, with more resources." - Andrew Lissimore

They always say that. Then my favorite product get changed, messed up then discontinued. Or my favorite store gets closed as they do away with competition. Or, worse yet my favorite place to work turns into one where everyone is stressed about hitting progressively better numbers every month.

Why would they ever say "We think we can push their employees harder, try to cut costs in ways that hopefully the customers won't notice and pull way more money out of it. And if that doesn't work we can grab what good ideas they have and end up with one less competitor."

 

[chelgrian]

It's good news for Sankar and any other Audeze shareholders, but them being bought by the PlayStation arm of Sony in particular is worrying. Recent PlayStation products have been using wireless protocols like PlayStation Link at the expense of Bluetooth (including their Pulse 3D headset and the PlayStation Portal streaming handheld), and that division is also pushing Sony 360 spatial audio at the expense of Atmos, DTS:X, etc., so I'd expect future gaming headsets from Audeze to work within those restrictions, and the audience that's currently buying Audeze headsets would not be happy with losing those features. They'll be fine so long as gaming headsets remain one of the pillars of their business and not their primary revenue source, but who knows how long that'll be the case.

So:

PlayStation Link audio is lossless partially for audio quality but mostly to avoid the encode and decode latency inherent to Bluetooth audio.

360 spatial audio is really MPEG-H and is produced from the same ADM files as Atmos. So far it's supported by Denon/Marantz, McIntosh and Sony. There is not much technically to choose between Atmos and MPEG-H as delivery formats so I fail to see why anyone should care unless they work for Dolby.

 

[SuicideSquid]

So:

PlayStation Link audio is lossless partially for audio quality but mostly to avoid the encode and decode latency inherent to Bluetooth audio.

360 spatial audio is really MPEG-H and is produced from the same ADM files as Atmos. So far it's supported by Denon/Marantz, McIntosh and Sony. There is not much technically to choose between Atmos and MPEG-H as delivery formats so I fail to see why anyone should care unless they work for Dolby.

Because universal standards are good and having Audeze products drop support for Bluetooth and Atmos in favour of Sony proprietary formats is bad.

 

[chelgrian]

Because universal standards are good and having Audeze products drop support for Bluetooth and Atmos in favour of Sony proprietary formats is bad.

Atmos is not a universal standard it is a proprietary Dolby technology.

There is no specific 3d audio support needed for headphones anyway as you are listening to a binaural render which needs no special support. The closest Audeze gets is bundling a Dolby Access license for Windows with some of their headsets. Even then they charge an extra £30 for the version with the bundled license to cover the fees to Dolby.

There is therefore no support to be dropped.

It's highly unlikely that they would drop Bluetooth support unless they marketed a PlayStation specific product.