Any thoughts that the Sony Universal Player cut into their disc player market?
Oppo Ceasing production
Just visited Oppo's web site. They are ceasing production of all their products and will only do warranty work and firmware support for their products. They no longer have the resources to manufacture new products. Didn't see this one coming.
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Definitely sad news! Fantastic company making up to date, attractive, reliable products, and offering top notch service. Regarding some wondering there's more to the story, I think it's dead simple. A viable / sustainable business keeps going, and those that aren't drop out. Saw a post on this site from Michael Green a few days ago. He mentioned the high-end slowing down in a big way, and having something close to 625 dealers in his network in the 90s. That REALLY stopped me in my tracks. I can't even imagine 200 high-end audio dealers existing today across all the brands. Seems like the old adage of the way to make a small fortune in this business is to start with a large one has never rung more true |
I agree with falconquest that physical media will survive, but it will become a thin market for new releases. As we all know there is a time period where no LPs were manufactured for most artists because the market was insufficient to support recording companies pressing vinyl and CD. The same will happen to Redbook; eventually we will have to download newly released music. My 17 year olds collect vinyl; they have one of my previous systems in their room. Their friends come over to our house sometimes to listen to music. They think it's cool that music is always playing at our house and that it sounds great...but, they also have never seen it happen anywhere else. FWIW these kids are buying video game soundtracks on vinyl and that might be where their generation decides to invest its audio dollars--they believe in headphones! |
genesis777 - That's a shame...I bought a Sonica Dac and was quite impressed with it. "Was", past tense? Just curious why your impression should change, when - IMO - it shouldn't. trelja - I can't even imagine 200 high-end audio dealers existing today across all the brands. Certain manufacturers, such as Oppo and Schiit, have already figured out that use of a dealer is often counter productive from a profitability perspective. This is the reason they sell direct to the end user/consumer. Win-win for both, and a big reason Oppo was successful. |
Probably has nothing to with the "death " of physical media. If so, why wouldn't Oppo just release a streamer? More than likely has to with trade and tariffs. What the future holds; we don't know. But, probably forced with the decision to raise their prices or cease production. They chose the latter. |
It really makes no sense. When you have a name and a product that has market respect... there is marketable value! Why isn’t the audio products business being sold to another respected brand who would probably like to have oppo??? Assuming they actually just walk away, what CD player or cd/dac combo can you buy for $1300 that is as good or better? |
Since you old folk are feeling without hope for the future of high end audio because your Blue ray drives are becoming defunct, I wrote a post in Misc Audio about my (a millennial's) journey from low-end to high-end audio. https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/a-millennial-recounts-their-journey-from-low-end-to-high-end-... TLDR: Thanks to Hi-fi streaming, high-end audio won't be dead anytime soon. |
Everything that has been said here on the OPPO situation is on the mark. One additional comment. OPPO as with many companies actually assembles their equipment in China. Consider the tariffs that have been imposed recently and how they add to the cost of production. The uncertainty of our world economic situation would give any company pause in planning their future. Note that OPPO stayed in the Chinese market. Frankly OPPO could have charged more for their products and still sold them in the USA. However the failure of UHD (No discs) makes selling players difficult to non audiophiles. If the CD goes the route of vinyl ( it appears to be doing that) then shifting the focus of OPPO players to the audiophile market would be the right move. Which is exactly what they have been doing for the last several years. I agree with the members who said that just too many factors made it difficult for OPPO to make money. A real shame when we lose innovative USA company of this caliber. |
I ordered a 203 yesterday. I use a 105 as a Digital transport into a Bryston DAC3 in my two channel system. The Oppo will output DSD from SACD into the Bryston over HDMI. I have two HT systems in my house and had been toying with the idea of moving the the 105 into one and replacing the 2 channel with a 203, since I am just using the 105 as a transport and am not benefiting from the DAC of the 105. The announcement made me pull the trigger. I will now replace several boxes in the HT system and send the Bluesound Node 2 in the HT system into the DAC of the 105. I also own the PM3 phones and consider them a great value. This has really bummed me out |
Odd, I already see some heavy price gouging on eBay for OPPO. And then I see some dropping prices, guess we have two schools of thought here. 1/Usually the case when somebody or something "dies", prices rise..... 2/ Some dealers probably don't want to be stuck with stock they maybe think they cannot shift. Interesting. Maybe I will wait for the crazies to clear out |
I called Oppo yesterday afternoon. They said that they have enough money in the bank to either develop new product or provide support/warranty on existing products for the next few years; they can't do both. Do to slower sales and higher cost of parts, they didn't see a future in new products. They don't think that they can generate enough sales going forward to keep the company going. I think they did the right/honorable thing and decided to put customer satisfaction first. I myself, have owned/own three Oppo products. I've never had a problem with any of them. I've never even had a reason to call them for anything; the products just worked! I'm shocked and saddened by their announcement. At least they'll walk off into the sunset with their heads held high. |
Maybe a good option when the 203s run out https://www.crutchfield.com/p_022BDA1060/Yamaha-AVENTAGE-BD-A1060.html?search=sacd+player |
@aberyclark https://www.crutchfield.com/p_022BDA1060/Yamaha-AVENTAGE-BD-A1060.html?search=sacd+player Not really tbh It may look good on paper which was exactly the reason I bought one, and then sold it within 3 months! Best description I can come up with is totally sterile on audio cds, bluray and dvd video playback was fine of course but you can get that with a $60 player nowadays. |
It would seem that on one hand, the parent company makes more on other lines than on these and has shifted resources, on the other, for whatever reason, they were not willing to raise their prices enough to make continued production feasible. The tariff wars with China probably had an effect as well. Why? Perhaps this: As SACDs are finally showing up more frequently on Amazon (although often at twice the price of buying them directly from Japanese vendors), the market for OPPOs and other SACD players wouldn’t appear to be growing, and with brick & mortar mass merchants such as Best Buy shedding the stocking of any physical media, one could make a case that the days of any non movie only disc players being essential vs streaming services are numbered. While most of us here would disagree, demographics support phones and tablets and (maybe) Blu-ray players as surviving longer... |
I still get Blu-ray discs from Netflix. They are still so much better than any streaming source. Love the 105 in my main system and the 103 in my office. They are fast and never miss a beat. As someone said before, there is more to this story than we know and it surely involves finances. Their disc players were worth what they charged but (for me) not much more. Is Tesla next? |
I am sorry to see Oppo end. In regard to high end and its approaching demise, I simply can’t believe it and won’t accept it. We as a community need to take every chance to educate and help the younger generation listen to what they’re missing. I try to play my system to anyone who will listen, and once they hear, they are hooked, ( and my system is not great ) I inform them how inexpensive it is to put together a great 2 channel “therapy” area, possibly start with a gently used Oppo player. Rage, rage against the dying of the light - Dylan Thomas |
Keep in mind that the Oppo cellphone brand, and Oppo Digital, are two separate entries under the same BBK Electronics corporate umbrella. OnePlus and Vivo are two other entities they own. So in a direct sense, Oppo Digital ≠ Oppo. Kind of sad I can’t upgrade my 105 to the 205 right now, but it is what it is. I’ll be moving up the digital food chain in a year or so when I’m ready to upgrade...and unfortunately have to pay a lot more for a different brand! |
As someone about to re-enter hifi (mid-fi, really) after decades of mediocre listening, I think there are several reasons the hifi market is dwindling. Most notably, hifi is not nearly so necessary for tolerable listening as it was when I bought my pioneer SA-9500 in 1976. I was not - and never have been - an audiophile (by most descriptions). But as a musician, music was important to me and I could not enjoy listening to recordings through the kind of crapy equipment my parents and other casual listeners used. Back then I had to forgo a first high school era car to but decent sound. Today, decent sound is available at relatively low cost. If I could have had sound equivalent to that produced by a $99 Dragonfly DAC and $250 650 headphones driven by my MAC Retina, I doubt I would have sacrificed a car for better audio. Now, my standards have increased (while my hearing has diminished) and I am quite willing to spend much more on audio than most people I know with comparable disposable income. Such are my priorities. But diminishing returns on the cost of audio seem to come much more quickly and unjustifiably now, than then. |
There has to be more here than meets the eye. How can a company that has been in business for some time suddenly not have the resources to continue to manufacture products that presumably they are making money on. This seems especially hard to believe when the bulk of your business is direct to customer which means you get paid immediately when you sell a product. Who took the money? |
+1 Chayro! Absolutely right as we tend to forget your average "millennial" is wowed by that huge fancy tv in bestbuy but is likely now only going to stream netflix or hulu say. They MAY just be persuaded to buy a 4k bluray player at the same time, as long as it is minimal invasion price, say $200 or less. Tell them they need pay more for the player than the tv and they will likely leave the shop in a hurry! |
I can’t help but wonder if this is the result of the impending tariff war between the US and China / Parent company and subsidiary. Likely not the only reason but maybe the final nail in the coffin. I will miss them but hope that this void gets filled in soon with some other products that meet or exceed their fantastic run. |
OPPO has had a good run and everyone I’ve talked to who owns one of their decks, absolutely loves them. So yeah, it seems this is a poor decision, that for all we know is based on what the masses want. But the masses are like sheep. They go where they are told when it comes to product "innovation" as if that is a good thing. Innovation is only good IMHO when it has real value to the consumer and society as a whole ... as in having a measurable benefit that is not just based on convenience to satisfy a growing lazy culture. From where I’m sitting, the masses and their real or perceived desires are cheapening our culture, under the delusion that progress is being made. Think about all the younger people who have only heard music in cheap digital formats. They don’t know what their ears are missing. Then there is the idea of reducing your footprint, which motivates some people to use the Cloud for their entertainment media. That is based on saving money and getting what you want immediately. It’s all about quick and cheap. I can’t think of any product or product category in the history of mankind (aside from the computer and software), where that is a good thing. This contributes to why there is a growing interest in "vintage" things across several product categories. People want products that have substance and a lasting quality. Maybe my opinion is tainted because I’m in my 50’s, and remember the good old days. But I can honestly say that I enjoy vinyl, cassettes and cd’s more now than when I did back in the 70’s and 80’s. In part, because I have a better system now, and the low cost of buying used media allows me more freedom to explore music. I also like the idea of owning my music. I don’t have to rely on using a computer, or using a streaming service to enjoy music. Frankly, it cheapens the music experience. The listener is not engaged with the "playing of music", rather it’s about bouncing around to listen to whatever, whenever. I’m generalizing here ... but most of you get my point. I like the process of purposeful listening. I like listening to albums mainly because I’m not just playing my favorites, and it’s a reminder of songs I either forgot about, or have a growing enjoyment for. The appeal of vintage audio is going to grow for at least another 10-15 years. The fact that companies who press vinyl are growing is going to increase available inventory in the marketplace that can be enjoyed for another 20 years. You can still find quality pressings from as early as the mid-60’s (~53 years ago) ... so I’m quite happy to enjoy vinyl knowing that no company is going to control my enjoyment and ownership of music for the rest of my life. |
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I own both the 203 and 205 and glad I bought when I did....both perform flawlessly. I tend to agree with earlier comments that the average millennial simply aren't the target market for these products....and that other technologies have certainly disrupted existing media platforms. It's all about making smart forward thinking strategic business decisions and suspect OPPO's resources will be further directed to support their huge brand in China for mobile phones.......but at a price and unfortunately leaves a huge void for some of us dinosaur's. |
We live in a junk culture that has no appreciation for quality, for history, for patience, for common sense, tradition, individuality and distinctiveness. Most of the crap that people buy these days is made to last a very short time, manufactured with the intent to be replaced, as opposed to being repaired because it’s cheaper to throw the crap out then to fix it. People are lured by a low price, and would rather buy something a dozen times than buy something of value that costs more money but last for years and never malfunctions. They are happy with a piece of crap that in the long run will cost a small fortune compared to a quality item that will cost WAY less in the long run. In other words, most people are just plain stupid! Anybody who perceives that Oppo gear is outrageously expensive is a complete idiot, with no sense of the value of the dollar, and no sense whatsoever of what constitutes value in the first place. They, the dumbed down masses who have lived their vapid lives conforming to what everybody else does, and having had their brains destroyed by television and "the phone", think that buying the $69 blue light special at Walmart, that will last a year if they’re lucky, is the steal of the century! Ignorance is bliss, and man oh man are there a lot of ignorant, dumbed down, dollar store shopping, junk hoarding, dumber than their smart phone imbeciles walking around on this doomed planet. What these morons don’t get, and never will get, is that a product like Oppo doesn’t come along very often. They will never understand that Oppo offered a value proposition all out of proportion to its price. Then again, how could we, the discerning people who care about quality and take pride in owning something that’s well designed, sounds great, looks great and gives us real pride of ownership... how could we possibly expect the masses to relate to this concept of excellence when all they have ever known, craved, and surrounded themselves with is garbage? I have a really decent audio system the sounds terrific, and will most likely last me for many years. When I play it, I actually sit down and actually LISTEN to the music. Unless the house is burning down, I stay seated and enjoy the experience. No facebook, no twitter, no snapchat, no emails telling me my casket and plot is ready - nothing but me and the music. This is my escape from the insanity and the stress that is turning people into nut cases. Into robots. Into complete dopes. This niche endeavor that we audiophiles/musicphiles enjoy and pursue will hopefully survive. This decision by Oppo doesn’t bode well for for discerning audio/video enthusiasts, and it’s a shame because there doesn’t seem to be a viable alternative out there that would come close to replacing these best of category components. When a great product is bought exclusively by a niche group, I guess this is what can happen. It does make you wonder who will be next, who will be the next victim of the evolution away from quality, away from music viewed as a beautiful work of art, an expression of truth via the universal language that is is, as opposed to a mere commodity/background noise like it is today. And the video that these Oppo players provide - absolutely stunning, nothing anywhere near the price can touch it! My brother has the first blue ray player Oppo made - BDP 83 I believe - still working like a charm and he is going to freak out when he heres a bout this, if he hasn’t already. I don’t even own one, and I’m upset! I've watched many movies and his Oppo shames every other DVD/Blue Ray player that he had in the past. Hey Oppo... do you see all the commotion you’ve created with this bombshell that you dropped on the real, bona fide video/audio community? Do you understand the massive amount of publicity you are getting right now? You make something that’s the best, and people are very upset about this situation. Put your thinking cap on, reconsider what you are doing, and think of the massive void that will exist when the last player comes down the assembly line. |
Oppo and most all the online stores are sold out of the 205.....Oppo told me there are no more coming. If you can find one now at retail, you are lucky. There are some 203s left but they will probably be all gone within a few days/weeks. Crutchfield sold over 100 205s earlier this week. Feeding frenzy. Some retailers are selling the last 205s for $2500 and yes, there are ones on ebay for $3500. If I had the money I would have bought 10 of them on Monday and then sold them in the fall for $3000+ each. What is so amazing the Oppo finally got it right and then had to bail. The 205 and the Sonica were the first Oppo products stock that I could stand. They actually sound good when burned in. With mods, they are outrageous.....way, way out there. I have spent the last year tweaking and re-tweaking my mods to the Sonica and now I will be putting all those mods and more into the 205 (info on my website in about one week re the basic mods)......but the only people who will get to enjoy these mods are ones who already have a 205 as they will be hard to come by from now on....including used. And they will fetch a ton of money used. |
I've been in this hobby since I was 15 years old-- back in the 1970's-- so what's changed? Money, in the form of disposable income. Wages and salaries for the middle class have been stagnant or in decline since then. Economic mobility in the US has collapsed. Not my opinion-- this is simply a straight read of decades worth of economic trend data. Kids aren't getting married or starting families nearly as much today either-- no money, little job stability, and diminishing prospects for this to turn around anytime soon. It sucks that young people today grow up listening to music (crap sounding MP3's in most cases) through cheap bean-sized earbuds. It's another reason for the loudness wars-- no one listening to loud music via earbuds wants wide dynamic range-- they want it compressed and LOUD-- and this is all most of them will ever be able to afford. Hi end mfg's have been jacking prices to create a "patina of prestige" around their products-- it's got nothing to do with cost for many of them. So the hi-value brands like Oppo are appealing to a vanishing class of people-- and I use that word intentionally. The US and for that matter, the EU middle class-- are an endangered species and there aren't going to be enough rich audiophiles to keep most of the remaining companies healthy for very much longer. The US middle class was the driver of economic growth and prosperity for our economy-- now they're just targets for rent-seeking monopolies-- and that has left consumer spending, compared to what it was decades ago-- anemic at best. The average American can't even come up with $400 cash to pay for an emergency expense-- like a car repair. So what are the odds they'll be able to put together a few thousand dollars spare to buy an entry level system? Diminishing at best. So this isn't about changing times and preferences-- a preference to only listen to low quality music on cheap earbuds-- it is about the change in the economic circumstances of most Americans. This is not politics-- though that has played a LARGE role in this state of affairs-- it's basic economics. Downwardly mobile populations of people do not make a great market for high quality goods and services, they make a good market for Wal-Mart and The Dollar Store. |
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There has to be more here than meets the eye. How can a company that has been in business for some time suddenly not have the resources to continue to manufacture products that presumably they are making money on. This seems especially hard to believe when the bulk of your business is direct to customer which means you get paid immediately when you sell a product. Who took the money?" Oppo Players are assembled in China. The factory that assembles the units requires a a minimum order to do a production run. Also, suppliers of custom parts, such as face-plates, circuit boards, etc also require a minimum order. In addition, there is a "up front" charges for developing dies for casing, masks for circuit boards, packaging and literature and software. For hypothetical reasons, lets say that Oppos Assembler requires a minimum production run of 3000 UDP-203's. parts and assembly costs = $185 Development, support, overhead and shipping = $130 Profit = $100 ---------------------------------- Dealer Cost = $415.00 Dealer profit = $135 ------------------------------------ Total cost = $550.00 Now if Oppo sells you a unit directly, their profit goes up to $200 ($235 - $35 shipping). So for a Production run of 3000 units, Oppo's cost is $915,000.00! Assuming half of sales are direct, profit would be $450,000. The unknowns here are what is the development cost including molds, dies, etchings, etc. How much is their overhead, salaries, healthcare, building lease/mortgage and advertising? How long does it take for 3000 units to sell? Only the people of Oppo know the answers to these questions. From my conversation with them, I got the impression that doing another production run was going to eat up too much of their operating capital. UDP-205's sold out in three days from the announcement. How long before UDP-203's are out of stock? Developing a new products takes a long time. So, it they do another production run, do they have enough cash in the bank to pay salaries and their mortgage? How many sales of month do they need to cover these expenses? Is the Parent Company tired of footing the bill for a subsidiary that has an ever shrinking market? Remember, we're the minority here. Most people these days are quite happy to stream "4K" Netflix or watch on a phone/tablet/computer. I watch more content these days on my computer (4K 32" monitor) than I do on my TV's and 4K projector. More content produces are forcing more content online. Right now I'm watching F1 practice my computer because it's not available on TV. I think Oppo made the smart choice, but I'm not happy about it. Hey, let's wind down our operation and give our employees time to find new jobs before we start bouncing payroll checks. This is something Toys-R-Us failed to do. |
