2. speakers
  3. 1354284767

Thiel Acquired by Private Equity Firm

Just saw the news regarding Thiel's acquisition. I have an outsider (and mostly uninformed) opinion that the company was very much driven by Jim's vision and that after his passing, something had to happen to replace the energy and focus he had. When the owners could not find a suitable replacement with their own resources, they opted to sell the business. Any thoughts as to what happens now? I am concerned that we will not see future innovations in the same vein as the past (maybe the will move more downstream to grow market share). I also worry that they might lose expertise which could impact their ability to honor warranty work...
miles_trane
jdoris
972 posts
 
Drat! And with all of Mrs. Thiel's talk about freedom!
metman
233 posts
 
Hopefully it's not some hedge fund with a Bain Capital killing plan in mind
unsound
7,332 posts
 
http://hometoys.com/news/2012/11/29/thiel-audio-acquired-by-nashville-based-private-equity-firm-/20000501

http://www.dealerscope.com/article/thiel-audio-acquired-private-equity-firm-25055493/1
ketchup
700 posts
 
The article mentioned that Gary was a long time Thiel employee. I though he was a fairly new employee?

So who will be designing the speakers now? After Jim passed, they came out with the CS2.4SE which is a CS2.4 with boutique caps and some cosmetic changes. Making new versions of existing products did not seem sustainable to me. I figured that's all they could do without Jim, then they came out with the CS2.7. Who designed that speaker, and who is going to design future products?
doggiehowser
672 posts
 
No. The 2.4SE was Jim's last hands on project. It was released after the 3.7 and bears his signature. It wasn't a big change but IMHO the upgrades over the regular 2.4 (upgraded finishing, aluminium outriggers, caps) would have cost similar to the 2.4 with the better finishings/outriggers.

That said, the 2.7 released after Jim's passing does seem to bear a Jim Thiel trait where a new model starts making a higher range model look obsolete :)

But this was all before the buyout so who knows.
More to discover