Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Exciting Opportunity - Meridian HQ Visit

I'm a bit surprised they haven't dipped their toe in wireless speaker market (in contrast to Naim). Especially given that the M80 provides the basis for this. Huge market, estimated to >50Bn USD by 2022.

Very well put gizzE!

"It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best adapt to change" - Charles Darwin.

Looking at their books I believe they have been making decisions based on cashflow rather than based on what the market wants.
I genuinely believe that they have made a decision to move into the custom install market, and aim their products at a customer where money is not really an issue, it is more about getting the system they want in place. Aim it at customers where recession doesn't really affect them, because they always have money.
Why do this? Because if it does work, you can develop very few new products at a cheap price with great returns. If it works.

If you don't have the cash to develop lots of new product....well.....you don't develop lots new product.

But the problem with that is those customers often didn't always have money, we are seeing a new generation of customer who fall into that category that have absolutely no clue who Meridian are. They haven't grown up reading the HI-Fi mags drooling over reviews of Meridian, Naim, Linn etc. They have grown up with the internet and brands like Sonos, who as far as they are concerned do everything they need.


Can you now install Sooloos on any computer as long as you have a Meridian DAC or Endpoint?
I'm a Meridian fan and I don't know if you can?

If I were Meridian I would be advertising like mad on Facebook, Twitter, HiFi press that customers can download Sooloos, install it and run it as long as it sees a Meridian product, that could be the Explorer, Charge £99 for it, think of it as cheap advertising, or an MS200, charge £199 and sell them in numbers, just get people buying Meridian.

Then speak to someone like Bluesound, use their products but put that special Meridian sauce on them, make sure they all also act as a Meridian end point and charge 25% more.

Imagine this with a pair of DSP speakers attached....



http://www.bluesound.com/en-gb/products/node-2/?cl

Or this controlled by Sooloos with that magical Meridian sonic signature and your favourite analogue speakers attached...



http://www.bluesound.com/en-gb/products/powernode-2/?cl


Or a nice wireless unit in the den still controlled by your Sooloos app...



http://www.bluesound.com/en-gb/products/pulse-mini/?cl




This is the sort of product people want, this is where you next DSP8000 customer starts. If they don't know who you are why do you think they will want your product?



I would love to spend a month at Meridian HQ.

Well said Gizze!

Adapt to change, engage with your customers, innovate and gain market leadership is essential these days.

Make it easy to choose Meridian. Evaluate your product lines, refresh those that are lagging and close the obvious gaps that are providing volume oppurtunites now and in the future. Leadership is required!

You're hired!

gIzzE

Sooloos on a PC? No you can't that would be Roon.

Sooloos on a QNAP yes you can, but I agree the PC would be a much better option, all you say is excellent but if the powers at be in Meridian couldn't see it over the last 2 years what chance they can see it now?

Russ

I would say that needs to be their next port of call.

Allow users to download Sooloos for their PC, it can be headless, all controlled from their iOS or Android device, Windows or Mac app. You need to make sure people have most of the kit to bite, if they have to go out and buy a QNAP for £300 and then a DAC/Endpoint for another £200 they simply won't bother to try it.

Also, make sure users can point the Sooloos at where their music storage is already, and not have to make a new storage location somewhere, whether that be a folder called music or their iTunes library, just make it easy to try.

Allow users to play their music through the built in output up to 44k, but if they want higher res or MQA then the app will see a Meridian device as a dongle and open up a world of hires and MQA.

I wonder if the last few years was spent on Roon and MQA rather than product direction?

And now it has been farmed out they are left trying to play catch up?

RECENT MUSINGS

CUSTOMERS
It has always been my experience that it is easier to sell to existing customers, than it is to find new ones.

If you do not treat existing customers as such, they will cease to be customers.

The cost of acquiring new customers is much greater than communicating with and servicing existing customers.

TECHNOLOGY and DOGMA
Wireless speakers are a reality and some are quite/very good.
To not go down this development route using the old mantra that we do not offer convenience over quality is a mistake. We have seen in the past many prospects have chosen convenience. The challenge is to improve the quality by design.

The opposite of this is to recognise that old thinking is no longer relevant and new knowledge has changed attitudes.
HiRes MQA is wonderful and has recently, well almost become "Universal".

SALES CHANNELS

With the advent of the new Meridian Web Site "Find a Dealer" function, I put in my Post Code + 50 mile Radius.

25 Dealers were listed. Of the 25 listed only 4 were listed as being able to demonstrate Meridian Systems.

The great majority of the other 24 were Installation companies.

How times and the fish to fry have changed.

FUTURE

I hope Meridian have got this strategy right for their independent future or possible sale/merger, to or with, another company, as they will need a much broader range of install related products to be of high value as a "One Stop Shop" to Designers Architects and Installers, in this already competitive market.

Hector

Apropos of wireless speakers...anyone remember the Caskeid announcement from 2 years ago? At this point MQA was still Meridian's

Both Meridian and MQA are listed as partners on the caskeid web site

Soundserge

MQA I am sure took up a lot of time and they lost valuable personnel when they split,

Roon seems to have been more of a divorce than a split and speculation was that Meridian wanted the new Sooloos (Roon) to run on existing Sooloos hardware, whilst very laudable it seems it forced too many compromises on the sw development hence the parting of the ways, subsequent Roon development has clearly shown that where the team wanted to be would not have been possible on legacy Sooloos HW, at this time John Buchanan promised exciting times ahead for Sooloos The reality seems to be the release of Touch:PC which is a C15 interface for the PC with certain functional restrictions for example you can't add an album from a USB memory stick? And the release of Sooloos core for the QNAP which is downloadable free of charge, sorry if I have missed anything else of relevance.

As Meridian and MQA were one company I think many HH are disappointed that with the exception of the 808v6, 818v3 and UltraDac all premium products, it has taken until March this year for the 218 to be released and this is definitely a custom install focussed product although I am sure HH's will buy it to, where were the M80, MS200, MS600 updates for MQA, a real chance to be ahead of the curve missed.

Russ

Along that same line Russ... there's a thread going on over on Roon about recommended Endpoints.

It has generated 4,500 views... and within that Thread, there's not one mention of a Meridian endpoint anywhere!!

Can we HH's even suggest an MS200, when it's glaringly missing MQA decode... no we can't... as I can't even bring myself to buy another one right now as I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Opportunity missed doesn't even begin to cover it... Sad.