The Role of R&D in Product Development

I will not buy from any company unless I see hard data backing their claims,….

That’s your choice.  In an ideal world, high-end audio would be transparent.  After investing time, effort, resources, few are willing to shoot themselves in the foot by revealing their R&D/engineering in our highly copy cat market especially cabling.  Most R&D results are kept in house- I’m somewhat surprised that your position is make results public - yes it’s great for the customer but terrible for the company to give their competitors the research for free.

Also, product markups must cover business operating costs.  Since our high-end hobby is a small niche market, higher markups are not uncommon.

I’ve given up on requiring proof of engineering, it won’t happen and it’ll severely limit my choices.  I simply look at reviews and use my ears to demo what I like within budget.  

@kennyc 

I apologize for creating confusion. I was not advocating that companies disclose all the details of how there products were designed and manufactured.

But they can publish how they test, list the test equipment used, publish data on final performance that shows the product meets claims and specifications, test report on the product received (may be skimpy, but signed by a human being), their QA practices, how they handle repairs, etc.

None of these discloses the "secret sauce" used in the product. They describe the processes used to ensure performance claims are met.

I developed a product that had numerous innovations, ones that placed the value of this product company's products far above similar offerings from competitors. None of my "secrets" were exposed, except ones that sales could use in their pitch and didn't expose anything we didn't want our customers to know for fear they'd tell our competitors. However, methods and test equipment, quality assurances, vendor reviews, suggested uses, practices for achieving best performance, customer training, repair and service are carefully laid out for all to review.

My inventions and ideas are protected by patents.

@kevemaher 

I carry a lot of cognitive dissonance regarding this hobby. My core system consists mid 90's amp and speakers (Krell KSA 300S, KRC-2, Thiel CS6 speakers, and Denon DP 47F turntable). I've been to 3 audio shows and heard a bunch of very expensive systems. In only a handful of cases have I heard systems that clearly out performed mine. My point here is that there has been a lot of smoke and fanfare but I'm not convinced that actual audible performance has improved all that much in the last 30 years with the exception of the ultra high end. I've heard a few systems at $500k+ that sounded incredible. I have great respect for the companies that make that gear and I'm happy that there are people who can afford it. But I've also heard several six-figure systems that were just OK but not great.

Audio is a mature industry. "New" ideas often mean bringing back designs that are decades old (i.e. field coil speakers) and perfecting them with new technology. The industry thrives because they've been able to convince us that a new, more expensive, piece of gear will sound better than the one we have. It's human nature that when we spend the money and hook it up we hear the improvement we expected to hear.

The quality of mass market audio is constantly improving and I believe that the design and marketing process that you describe is how we got here. Just the other day I was at the audio store that sold and installed my A/V system (we just built a new house) and they had a pair of SVS Ultra Evolution Pinnacle speakers. I asked to listen to them and I was pleasantly amazed. For $5k they sounded really good. I mean really, really good. I don't know much about SVS except that the speakers are manufactured in China, but those speakers didn't just happen on a fluke. SVS apparently has their act together to produce something that good for that price. I'm guessing that there design and manufacuring process is state of the art.

@8th-note 

Thanks for your post.

One of the places where I worked supplies ultra-high end molecular biology instruments. I developed PCR instruments (stripped down end point versions of PCR machines were used for Covid detection) and DNA sequencers. Exotic CCD arrays, ultra powerful LED sources, innovative optical filters, etc... Every component was state of the art for the time. Customers demanded the highest performance.

Yet we still had all the rigorous manufacturing process I've described. These were strictly adhered to.

Scientists that buy and use this equipment are some of the most sophisticated, demanding customers around. They're willing to pay for the performance, but really want reliable, believable, consistent results. We had to demonstrate performance to them in real time using their preferred sample preparation (kinda like an in-home speaker evaluation). Hundreds of these instruments selling for several hundred thousand dollars each were built and sold every year. And continue to be sold today (with performance upgrades).

If we hadn't done all the background work, we never would have been competitive.

One could argue that perhaps audio enthusiasts are not well-informed customers. I highly doubt that. There's too much information readily available. They are quite sophisticated (and very loud sometimes) in what performance they want.

With all respect to those who have written so eloquently, most high end audio manufacturers are remarkably small companies.  Many with less than ten employees, including the owner.  So, no "departments".  Everybody does everything from answering the phone, assembly to shipping.  It's the owner who does the new product development and marketing.