Why wouldn’t they sell the operation? This isn’t about resources, it’s about strategic business decisions. Very strange.
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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I am not really worried about support and updates at this point. What worries me is that a company like Oppo, with a superb value proposition, can't stay in the game. I get the whole physical media being dead argument. But why not jump the shark? They are saying they are going to cease production of products, not just physical media. This is just weird. |
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Clearly seem to be doing other things though... "Chinese smartphone maker Oppo has been given green clearance to set up a mobile manufacturing unit in Greater Noida at a cost of Rs 2,200 crore, a senior government official said. The Union Environment Ministry has granted the environment clearance to its Indian subsidiary Oppo Mobiles India Pvt Ltd for the proposed project." Read more at: //economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/62006240.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst |
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I would think Cambridge Audio would be in a position to buy the rights to build Oppo products under their own badge. I’m sure they’ve been talking with others as well. Marantz and others have stopped making Blu-ray players and soon it will be the CD player which Ayre and others have dropped as well. It’s all moving to the internet folks. Sad news nonetheless. |
By far the best BD player I've owned. For a BD player, the 205 is expensive but worth it. For a CD/SACD player it is relatively inexpensive and very good value. Put them both together and you have a product that anyone should appreciate. BTW last might I A/B'd a 4K movie downloaded via Amazon Prime/Roku and compared it to a 4K Blue Ray disc played on my Oppo 205 using the same Anthem AVM-60 pre/pro. Same HDMI cable brand and model passing from the Roku and Oppo to the AVM-60. Video quality is similar. But the Oppo 205 player audio quality kills the Roku download audio quality. |
Well, my DV-970HD i still running. Hoping my UDP-205 runs for at least 5 years - purely based on the build quality. For folks who are planning to get an Oppo UDP-205 for audio only, I say, get one. Oppo has great https://www.oppodigital.com/farewell.aspx |
The decline of physical media didn't happen suddenly last week. That has been brewing for years. Oppo developed and launched the 203/205 generation as a significant improvement on the already good 103/105 generation recently. Pulling the plug now rather than 2 years ago is just strange. I don't think we know the whole story yet. |
This is indeed very sad news and for me a huge shock! I own three of their players bdp83...owned 6 years bdp 93....owned 3 years bdp105...owned 1 year not one of them have been touched at all and all still give faultless service maybe that's part of the problem? stuff that does not break or wear out and gives perfect service does not tend to be replaced or upgraded as often. Sad but maybe they were built too well? At least in todays throw away, flavour of the week society. But whatever if somebody like Oppo cannot make it work the $ numbers any longer could anybody else who take over the operation? |
I think you are correct that Oppo units were used by a LOT of other manufacturers as they were just so good at such a fair price that the competition just could not justify the cost of trying to make their own to compete or be better. Of course then there was ONE infamous manufacturer who decided they would just put a complete Oppo inside their box and sell it under their own brand name at a massive mark up.....that did not end well for them..... |
I am very disappointed to hear this news but, I assume, the sales of physical media (CD's) is declining and probably their product sales are not good. OPPO is a great company and, I would have hoped, maybe, they could have started building other products. A noted above, I guess they could have also sold the business but, for some reason, decided not to do. The Audio Industry needs to step up to attract more customers. Time will tell what happens. Maybe everyone on Audiogon needs to buy at least one new audio product this year (I have). |
From August 2017 up to today, I bought 8 new pieces of equipment. This is a dying hobby and when all of us old geezers (I'm 64) go, the High End will die with us. Case in point: I offered to give my son (36 years old) a high end integrated amp, high end speakers, turntable and cd player (total cost of equipment over 10K) with the only stipulation he uses it and doesn't sell it. He didn't want it. He said all he needs is his phone and headphones. This is coming from a kid who grew up in a household with high end equipment and who used to sit and listen with me. The High End is doomed. |
As someone who is relatively young (36), and a long time member of this forum, I have to say that yes, High End is doomed. None of my friends in my age range are into this hobby, and the high prices of gear are a definite turn off to younger people/millenials. Even I don't spend much money on gear, I tend to stick to budget components and have rarely spent over $300 on a single component. I tend to buy mainly on audiogon and other forums. I haven't so much as walked into a B&M audio dealer in 14 years. |
High end has always been a niche within a niche and it is shrinking, I do not believe that it is a dying hobby, there will always be high end, but as the market share shrinks manufacturers of high end keep on jacking up the already astronomical prices to make up for the lost sales, we will see more of them going bankrupt in the near future. Credit goes to home theater and also the young generation who listen to free music on their portable devices, the sound coming through these digital devices is like listening to music through high frequency drivers only, but kids grow up with this and will never know what quality is all about. Who knows maybe some of this will survive in the Far East, they seem to be more receptive to high end than the West, but we shall see. |
stereo5, your story is very telling of the state of the affairs in the 2-channel home audio interest. I’m about your age and with the exception of a handful of remaining friends from college, I don’t know of anyone else, at any age, who actually owns a decent stereo system at their homes, even the ones whose kids actually play various instruments. The weird thing is most of them know and track new music and bands but use nothing else except earbuds. When my buddy’s son graduated from high school I bought him a nice Creek integrated and a pair of Wharfdale speakers for his college. Later I heard he returned them and got a nice pair of earphones instead. Damn good pair I must admit. |
Same situation here, I'm 58, have had 2-ch systems since putting together my first at age 15. None of my friends buy music. None of my kids have any interest in my current system. Even my wife (who's close enough to perfect for me), can't share my interest in JUST LISTENING TO MUSIC. My thoughts are: We can't be wrong, what's wrong with everybody else??? |
There is no way to determine, absent more information, why they closed the business. Someone can make a really great product (great design, high performance, reliable, and reasonably priced) and be in a vibrant market and still fail because of business decisions made (e.g., taking on too much debt, critical parts supplier no longer making the parts available). What is more surprising to me is how some companies can make really crappy stuff and continue to thrive. |
FYI, courtesy of RIAA:@david_ten Thank you! FWIW, "I’m so glad" my music of choice - Grateful Dead and "related configurations" - falls into a category not covered by the statistics in either of the articles - that would be "freely shared via peer-to-peer trading". :) |
I'm going to be a contrarian here. People say physical media is dead but just look at the resurgence of vinyl. My sense is, that CD transports are the "digital turntables" of the future. I just traded my Ayre multi disc player for a dedicated transport. Of course, I type this as my 103D plays in the background and I just ordered a new disc from Amazon. I can stream as well but my sense is that physical media is not dead by any means. |
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