Schipo:
With all due respect, you are misinformed. The better cable brands are proprietary designs - again, some are enormously complex and very difficult to manufacture. I'm not here to defend the audio cable industry - there are indeed cable brands that are nothing more than what you describe and the bullshit factor with cables can be very high - but there a lot of cable companies, Cardas, Jena, Synergistic, Audio Quest, PAD, to name just a few, that produce highly complex designs with a lot of science behind them.
As explained above, most cable brands are guys that design from their computers and who outsource production to large manufacturers like Belden. Kimber, Transparent and Cardas have their own production facilities, but they are the exception. Regarding "lab coats", your basic message is correct inasmuch as most high-end two-channel manufacturers (of cables, speakers, preamps, amps, CD players, etc.) are one to four-person outfits, often times operated on a part-time basis as a side business, that are not what people typically think of as a "company". Much of the time, they hire industry veterans as consultants on a per-project basis to design their gear. Taking Kevin Carter, for example, he was employed by VAC and designed its Renaissance amplifiers, and thereafter has done projects for other hi-end companies, most recently, for Art Audio (he also has a product line and does business as K&K Audio).
PS - I've been associated with the industry for thirty-five years and my knowledge of the audio cable business is not based upon something that some manufacturer told me (or that some no-nothing wrote on an audio forum).
