Strategy in TECH...
HTSA, the Home Technology Specialists of America buying group, announced today that Jon Robbins, its current Executive Director, is leaving the organization. Robbins has held this role since he first assumed it in December of 2015.
In a communication with dealers this week, Nice North America, the global holding company for many important custom integration brands, announced it has pulled out of the CEDIA Expo 2026. The company says this is a “strategic” move as it seeks to focus its marketing investments on “initiatives that deliver greater value…”
Back in 2023, Strata-gee did a series of stories on Audio Research Corporation, a high-end tube amplifier manufacturer widely respected in the high-end community, but then going through financial struggles. In fact, when we last visited the Minnesota-based company, they had entered into a legal/financial process known as Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors (ABC), a form of receivership that is an alternative to bankruptcy. We revisit them now for an update.
In an announcement that shocked dealers, Dynaudio announced today that it intends to exit the North American market and shift its priorities to other global markets offering “the strongest strategic opportunities.” With this decision, the company will be permanently closing its U.S. subsidiary sometime in the “fall of 2026.”
For a few months now, we’ve been seeing a moderation in enthusiasm on Wall Street for Artificial Intelligence (AI) investment. On several occasions, a major tech company would announce a new multi-billion-dollar investment to acquire chips or other AI technology…or to build huge data centers to train LLMs…only to see their stock value crash. In a nutshell, investors are coming to believe that there is no way AI can hit a level of success great enough to repay the now trillions of dollars of collective investment by big Tech to create it.
Then, this week, Ford Motor Company announced it would rehire more than 300 engineers who had been let go to turn their jobs over to AI. Ford admits its AI ambitions failed and has rehired these “graybeard” veteran engineers with decades of experience to improve product quality.
Audio Advice, a prominent smart home retailer and custom integrator based in Raleigh, North Carolina, announced today that it has acquired Sound Components, another well-known AV integrator based in Miami, Florida. This move joins two well-respected and popular integration industry players into one large multi-market integration business.
This week, ADI Global Distribution, currently part of Resideo Technologies but soon to be split off as an independent company, has sent an email message to Control4 dealers reassuring them that nothing is going to change when the company goes independent from Resideo. The email to dealers, which has been viewed by Strata-gee, reassured dealers that ADI’s commitment to Contro4 is stronger than ever.
But, is it?
In an industry often defined by rapid-fire technological shifts, I have spent the last thirty years mastering a different kind of evolution: the strategic bridge between high-end custom integration and national scale. From the high-fidelity showroom floors of Detroit’s legendary Pecar Electronics to the corporate boardroom of a billion-dollar distributor, my constantly evolving career serves as a masterclass in how to pivot to navigate the complexity of the AV custom integration market.
The purpose of this story is to share some of the milestones and career pivots that combined to help shape my “Be a Trusted Partner” philosophy—and how this principle helped to turn a security giant into an AV powerhouse.
Multiple sources are reporting that last week, Resideo Technologies’ company ADI unexpectedly executed layoffs of what they believe to be large numbers of employees, potentially in the hundreds. Many, if not most, of these layoffs are said to be centered on ADI’s Control4 unit legacy employees.
Sony Group recently announced it is forming a co-development partnership with chip manufacturing giant Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) to create what it calls the next generation of AI image sensors. In announcing the partnership, the company revealed that, with these next-level AI sensors, it is targeting the advanced robotics and automotive segments.
