Some companies are small and some what unknown however spend much time and funds with research (as mentioned by Elizabeth). Their products however can be excellent! One such company I use is Silver Audio. (silveraudio.com) I highly recommend you take a look/listen.
Big name company or smaller company?
I am looking to replace my cables and it seems here on Audiogon a lot of smaller cable companies like Zen and Coincident (and many more) are recommended. I currently have MIT Terminator 2 and was not sure if I should stick with auditioning the better MIT's, or Cardas', etc. If I buy from a smaller company I could be stuck and have no resale value to fall back on. Do these smaller companies offer that much more value? Don't the larger companies have more resources, etc...? I notice most of the people with "better" systems use big name cables, including reviewers. Of course I would like to get the most for my money. ???