The Private Equity Buyout Of Music Production

[James Steele]

Came across this video the other day discussing all the acquisitions lately in pro audio hardware/software and it seemed rather though provoking. Thought I'd share.

[leigh]

It's our cannibalistic culture at it's finest.

**Leigh

[mhschmieder]

Thanks for posting that. I have been so concerned over the massive and rapid industry consolidation that I have been trying to severely prune how many vendors I deal with, to minimize my risk of holding mostly abandonware.

[monkey man]

Yeah, it doesn't fill me with confidence either Mark.

[James Steele]

Thanks for posting that. I have been so concerned over the massive and rapid industry consolidation that I have been trying to severely prune how many vendors I deal with, to minimize my risk of holding mostly abandonware.

Let's just hope... dare I say it... that one of these firms doesn't gobble up MOTU. I'm pretty sure they're privately owned, but I could see the temptation for owners of companies like that to cash out and take a buyout like that and retire. I noticed that if you go to the Plugin Alliance website you see this now:

02-Jul-2023.jpg (14.78 KiB) Viewed 1917 times

Note the "by Native Instruments" tagline.

[monkey man]

... and one of the reasons I invested heavily in PA plugs is that it wasn't Waves or NI.

[mhschmieder]

Yep. I just bought two perpetual licenses for Plug-in Alliance products that came along since the subscription model, that I use all the time, but for the most part I use a very small part of their catalog (same as with Native Instruments) and may try to wean myself away at this point. I depended heavily on NI's Absynth, and was rather shocked when it got dropped.

My PA sub is up VERY soon, so I am hoping to wrap up some album production early enough to be able to take stock of how dependent I am on more recent additions to the bundle; similarly with other vendors. I

think the only vendor I depend on heavily that I am confident will be around in ten years is Vienna Symphonic Library. They rent out the Synchron Stage to movie producers to record scores, so that's a steady income regardless of plug-in and VI trends.

[mikehalloran]

I’ve been taking advantage of the recent PA sales before discontinuing my subscription, too. They run sales so often, this will save me a lot of money.

I suppose that, since my daughter works for Bain, I should recuse myself from the main topic of this thread but I really don’t have anything interesting to add.

[monkey man]

I should recuse myself from the main topic of this thread but I really don’t have anything interesting to add.

You never have anything interesting to add Brother Mike...

... just pertinent facts and details I find invaluable.