Former SpeakerCraft CEO Jeremy Burkhardt Buys Soundcast Systems
Soundcast Systems, developer and manufacturer of wireless music systems, has been purchased by former SpeakerCraft CEO Jeremy Burkhardt. Burkhardt brings 23 years of industry experience to the company. It looks like he’s decided to compete directly with his old company. He is also currently suing SpeakerCraft, with whom he had a non-compete, but Burkhardt says is invalid. This should be interesting to watch.
Burkhardt says, “Soundcast is an innovative, engineering driven company and one of the first to deliver high-performance working wireless technology and portable outdoor speakers. The unique opportunity lays in the fact that it’s a company with proven cutting-edge wireless, DSP and amplifier technologies with multiple patents under its belt. They’ve lacked the capital resources to grow the business with more products, marketing and field training initiatives that are necessary for its dealers.”
Burkhardt’s longtime business partner Jeff Francisco will take the role of CTO at the company, but the company says it will maintain its current management, sales and operations team, including Oscar Ciornei as head of business development. “Soundcast already has a great management and sales team in place, but together we will make a great team even better by adding our collective strengths along with the financial resources I can deliver to the company. With our added people and resources we will strengthen our customer service, technical support, product time-to-market and new product innovations,” Burkhardt said.
The headquarters will remain in Chula Vista, Calif. In addition, expansion plans will be announced in the near future for larger headquarters facilities and staffing.
Soundcast’s current and ongoing president Mike Weaver states, “Jeremy brings a powerful combination of vision, experience and fervor to Soundcast. All that plus a combination of new products and more ways to use existing platforms to grow with our channel partners. I am excited to work alongside Jeremy, our leadership team and network of global partners to rapidly grow Soundcast to new heights.”
The company plans to accelerate the development of new products that best fit the needs of the modern connected world, with many new innovative models slated for 2013 and 2014.
Soundcast has one of the most comprehensive patent portfolios for wireless audio in the world. The company says it plans to aggressively protect the company’s intellectual property of its wireless audio, digital amplification and proprietary high-performance battery technologies.
For more information on Soundcast, click here: http://www.soundcastsystems.com