CEDIA 2022

Subwoofer aficionados in America still know the Velodyne name, despite the company having gone dormant and changing ownership in 2019. Founded in 1983, Velodyne Acoustics received over 200 patents for subwoofer-related technologies. The new ownership, located in Hamburg Germany, has partnered with Origin Acoustics to bring the brand back to the U.S., albeit strictly through the CI (custom install) channel. That means if you want to buy one, or just find out how much they cost, you’ll have to contact a custom installer.

Unfortunately, the company did not demo Velodyne subs at CEDIA 2022. It did have a few examples on static display. So I opted to interview with Miranda Grantham—the national sales director for Origin—about the return of Velodyne.

S&V: Is CEDIA 2022 treating you well?
Origin: Yeah, it’s been a pretty incredible response between the Velodyne partnership, also the Bang & Olufsen North American distributorship partnership, it's been a pretty cool experience. The response from all the dealers has been very positive and we’re excited to get everything moving.

S&V: From a technical standpoint, what differentiates Velodyne from the CI products Origin already offers?
Origin: So Velodyne really is a legacy brand, the Velodyne name is very well known and has a positive connotation throughout decades. The Origin brand is really good product, it's a different price point. So it will work in conjunction with the Origin products as a step up, higher end, higher performing option for the integrators.

S&V: What’s in them. Are the subs engineered in-house by Velodyne?
Origin: The cool thing about the Velodyne partnership, the folks that bought them in 2018 have just as much passion for the brand as the original creator of Velodyne. So they're bringing back a lot of the previous products but with better specs and making them a little bit beefier and keeping the quality and the integrity that Velodyne is known for. Also, creating new products, they kept a lot of the original engineers for Velodyne when the purchase happened. So, a lot of the same people are still with Velodyne.

S&V: So the company is the real Velodyne.
Origin: It's a really cool partnership. And one of the things that really intrigued us is they actually have parts to service all Velodyne products going back 20 years. So there's a lot of service and customer experience built into it, and a lot of the same foundational blocks that Origin is built on Velodyne also believes in so the partnership will work very well as not only a really cool product but also a serviceable product that really helps the integrators with existing products in the field.

S&V: So is it now locked into the CI channel? Is there any retail outlet for Velodyne?
Origin: I don't believe that's the path, that's not Origin’s path. So I don't believe that Velodyne will be taking that path either. We very much believe in having a CI channel only, to keep margins and integrity in place.