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I will say this, whenever I've been privy to top companies' long term plans under strict non-disclosure, I've been amazed at their long term planning. They can tell you what will be in ver. 1.0, 2.0 and beyond. These are with 18-24 month development cycles. This is not in the MI space but rather software/computers. Japanese companies, in particular, have long been known for their strategic planning and vision.

Fron a Sound on Sound Article
"Back in June 1995, Korg asked me whether I would be willing to exhibit some vintage keyboards at an event they were planning to hold in the Science Museum in Kensington, London. They wanted to demonstrate the progress they had made since their earliest days, so I took a Minikorg 700, a Trident, a Polysix, and a PS3200, and sat back to enjoy whatever it was that the company had lined up for the evening. Soon, I wasn't leaning back, but leaning forward, intent on gleaning everything that I could from the presentation. The event was, of course, the dual launch of the Trinity and Prophecy, and it was riveting.

But dramatic though the launches were, the presenter, Korg's Steve McNally, kept referring to two mythical products that appeared simultaneously to predate and supersede the Trinity and the Prophecy. Both had been developed at Korg R&D in California. The first, called Synth Kit, was a software environment within which the physical models in the Prophecy had been developed. Based on a Mac computer with additional DSP hardware, it was perhaps the first system capable of crunching the numbers needed to perform physical modelling in real-time.

The other was a keyboard designed using Synth Kit, intended for thee and me, and which was mooted to cost £10,000. This huge sum of money was justified by the instrument's ability to run several synthesis engines simultaneously. There was even an example of it on show. It was big, it was blue, it was called OASYS, (the Open Architecture SYnthesis System) and it looked the business. But we couldn't touch it, we couldn't play it, and we most certainly couldn't hear it.

The OASYS concept was an appealing one and, in 1995, quite radical. To quote Mr McNally, whom I subsequently interviewed, "OASYS is basically a computer, rather than a hard-wired keyboard synthesizer. If you want to change how it works you can load a completely different synthesis system from a hard drive. It's multitimbral as well as polyphonic, and can also be multitimbral in the sense that different types of synthesis can be positioned under different areas of the keyboard. For example, you can have a single patch which, when you play softly at the top of the keyboard, gives you an FM sound layered with an analogue sound, but gives you a physical model of a saxophone when you play a little bit harder, and a PCM sample of a pipe organ when you bring in the ribbon controller... It's all completely controllable."

Umm... no, it wasn't. The 'Blue Bomber' (as it was later called within Korg) never appeared. The reason was that it didn't work. Apart from a few limited demos, it had never worked, and it was never going to work. The technology available in 1995 simply wasn't up to the task."

----------

The results of Korg's long term vision are obvious in the OASYS/Kronos. All I can tell from Yamaha is that they like to trickle-down from the Tyros. Roland I have no idea.

Busch.

rrricky rrrecordo wrote:

burningbusch wrote:Yamaha just introduced the Motif XF so it's going to be a while (3+ years) before they come out with a sequel or something completely new.

I'm not sure "introduced" is the right word here. The XF is simply an XS with a new paint job, bigger wave ROM and flash storage. It's just an update.

I wouldn't count on a three year interval between now and Yamaha's next real introduction

MOTIF - 2001
MOTIF ES - 2003
MOTTIF XS - 2007
MOTIF XF - 2010

All Motifs were ROM updates and tweaks to the original and it has now been 10 years. Don't count on Yamaha rushing something out the door just because Korg came out with the Kronos.

Busch.

Also, the Nord Electro is arguably the most successful keyboard in the last ten years. It was introduced in 2001. Roland made a half-hearted attempt to compete against it with the V-Combos. Korg brought out the SV-1 in Sept 2009. Yamaha has never produced a direct competitor. Obviously there was a big market for a keyboard like the Electro but the big 3 seemed OK with Nord owning, for the most part.

My point is, just because one company comes out with a very successful product (e.g. Electro), or in the case of the Kronos, a potentially successful product, it doesn't follow that everyone else is going to immediately change direction and come out with something similar.

Busch.

burningbusch wrote: All I can tell from Yamaha is that they like to trickle-down from the Tyros. Roland I have no idea.

Busch.

That makes sense, given Yamaha's non-existent presence in the synthesizer market, and being king of the PRS 'junk for the masses' genre of keyboard. When one considers a legacy of GX1, CS80, CP80, GS1, DX1/7, SY77/99 and VL1, it is quite staggering how pathetic a company they have become. They're like NASA after it abandoned the Apollo programme - squandering a rich legacy and letting all of their engineers retire. Those running Yamaha electronic keyboards ought to be ashamed of themselves.

Kevin Nolan wrote:

burningbusch wrote: All I can tell from Yamaha is that they like to trickle-down from the Tyros. Roland I have no idea.

Busch.

That makes sense, given Yamaha's non-existent presence in the synthesizer market, and being king of the PRS 'junk for the masses' genre of keyboard. When one considers a legacy of GX1, CS80, CP80, GS1, DX1/7, SY77/99 and VL1, it is quite staggering how pathetic a company they have become. They're like NASA after it abandoned the Apollo programme - squandering a rich legacy and letting all of their engineers retire. Those running Yamaha electronic keyboards ought to be ashamed of themselves.

Maybe Yamaha is giving to the market what the market is asking for. They don't need to be innovative they just need to be reliable to artists, performers and composers. Could you imagine any blind artist trying to switch or program a sound with a touch screen? Kurzweil is on that track too, reliable, strong and durable gear. That's just my opinion no pun intended.

In general, I agree with many of burningbusch's points. In MI, most things take a while to come to market. I wanted to address this one point, however:

burningbusch wrote:Also, the Nord Electro is arguably the most successful keyboard in the last ten years.

Nord definitely makes cool gear. However, if by "most successful" you mean "best selling," then judging by the standard industry sales data they're not even close. They're red, though, which may make them more literally visible than others.

Busch, you're giving the long term vision... Not development.

For instance, Kronos is using Atom CPU/mobo... This wasn't existing 15 years ago, even not 5 years ago when the Oasys has been released. Korg has been able to use new components such Atom, SSD, etc... because the technology became available and they surely adjust the product to those choices.

It clearly doesn't change the philosophy or vision of the future which is closely the same between the Oasys and the Kronos, but improvements and adjustements allow to have dual core CPU and then keeping the same amount of polyphony even with 12 heavy FX.

I'm sure Korg had already in options to use micro-ITX board at the time of Oasys, but they went with the P4 because it was the best choice at this time.
The same way, in early-stage of the Kronos they had a version without the SSD if it wasn't financially possible... The same way they probably wanted to do something else and couldn't and it will only appear in the future products if it will become possible to do so.

Roland isn't different. Will they radically change their vision and philosophy overnight? Of course not! But they can clearly look better to a second possibility/choice in their development if they believe it could help to bring a better product to fit to the current market.

Otherwise, it will only say they don't care at all about customers feedback and they just execute their big 10-20 years plan...

Phil

kandarv wrote:

Kevin Nolan wrote:

burningbusch wrote: All I can tell from Yamaha is that they like to trickle-down from the Tyros. Roland I have no idea.

Busch.

That makes sense, given Yamaha's non-existent presence in the synthesizer market, and being king of the PRS 'junk for the masses' genre of keyboard. When one considers a legacy of GX1, CS80, CP80, GS1, DX1/7, SY77/99 and VL1, it is quite staggering how pathetic a company they have become. They're like NASA after it abandoned the Apollo programme - squandering a rich legacy and letting all of their engineers retire. Those running Yamaha electronic keyboards ought to be ashamed of themselves.

Maybe Yamaha is giving to the market what the market is asking for. They don't need to be innovative they just need to be reliable to artists, performers and composers. Could you imagine any blind artist trying to switch or program a sound with a touch screen? Kurzweil is on that track too, reliable, strong and durable gear. That's just my opinion no pun intended.

While I understand that producing the classics of the past was probably not financially worthwhile in themselves, those classic instrument helped shape the history of music. To me, that's an important dimension to this. There is no point to producing _only_ instruments that 'the market wants'.

Furthermore, as no doubt Steve Jobs would point out - the 'market' often does not know what it wants. That's why companies innovate. And this is the crux of the matter for Yamaha. They stopped innovating synthesizers, electric pianos and all round in electric and electronic music instruments at the EX5. The classics I mentioned came from a desire to be innovative within Yamaha and that made them a very exciting company with astounding instruments that affected the face of music. None of that happens today.

What saddens me the most about Yamaha in particular is that they have massive resources - and - they still have incredible knowhow through their pianos, disklavier, silent range, digital mixers and yes the excellent Tyros. If only they'd bring some of that expertise to synthesizers in earnest; they above all other companies could change the game for synthesizers, as they used to.

I had hoped that OASYS / Kronos would have motivated Yamaha and Roland to engage the synthesizer/ workstation market with real earnest; but perhaps that's just wishful thinking. Certainly within Yamaha there seems to be a blanket declaration to _not_ be involved in synthesizers.

But the suggestion that Tyros/PRS and Motif exist because it what masses want in a sad indictment on Yamaha, and on the masses / market for that matter. How incredibly drab. Is that the sorry state of music in the wider population? And - reliability should be a given, not a goal in itself. Are you suggesting that no innovation needs to happen - we've covered it all? Synthesizers mean new approaches to music - and it seems that Yamaha in particular is run by managers who do not understand that point (but all companies, including Korg, struggle with this premise in my opinion - even with OASYS/Kronos, we're nowhere near where we could/should be if all synthesizer companies innovated the way they used to).


Kevin.

kandarv wrote:

Kevin Nolan wrote:When one considers a legacy of GX1, CS80, CP80, GS1, DX1/7, SY77/99 and VL1, They're like NASA after it abandoned the Apollo programme

Maybe Yamaha is giving to the market what the market is asking for.

1) I am afraid I have to say "amen" to Kandarv. The market is asking for 25 keys VAs AND some stage piano. stop.

2) I am afraid I do, AFTER having agreed with Kevin. "Yamaha" used to be named in the same breath as "moog" when it created gs1, gx1 and vl1, now you name it in the same breath as "toyota".

3) on the other hand there's a catch in the "give the market what it wants" idea.

market NEVER generate innovation.

NOBODY among end users ever dreamt, much less DEMANDED, for a 50 bucks 3G phone with video, which is now something 10-year-old kids use.

Ok, maybe 15000 managers, 1300 nerds and 23 secret agents really ASKED for it.

But the MILLIONS cell phones were SOLD to the public AFTER having beeing created by industries.

It was not response to a demand. It was courage to induce the public to use a totally new idea.

The same happened for computers.

The same happend for the minimoog.

Not even Keith Emerson ASKED for a modular synth. Moog designed it, advertised it, it sold it to a customer who later gave it back, emerson bought it second-hand.

After emerson had played the modular for some time, yeah, maybe 5 musicians asked for a portable synth and called moog music with their specifications ready.

The other 24995 had it SOLD to them.

(this is why it was so good, and it wasn't red, or 88-keys, or with a tv screen, or duophonic, or... you name it)

So, if Yammy and Roland had ideas and the money to enact them,

and created a really innovative instrument,

we'd be there.

For the moment it's not "the martket" who lacks ideas.

Look at this whole forum.

while the comparative rarity and significantly superior physical chassis / control of OASYS will make it desirabl[/i]

I think the Kronos superseded the Oasys in virtually every respect accept size and style for me , i was pondering a cheap oasys a few months back ( £2500 ) but thought i would hold back and see what Korg did with all the developments and then Kronos was announced ( it was exactly what i was hoping for - an Oasys mk2 ) .

Kronos killed my want for an Oasys stone dead and my guess is many others feel the same.

I treat a Roland vsynth / motif hybrid as a different machine

For me you need both , vsynth technology goes places the Kronos never will and vice versa but i buy synths for their synthesis ability and not as workstations.

I certainly hope Roland update vsynth technology so it can actually load decent amounts of sample data ( 64 mb is really tedious) and that they maybe implement some new and novel synthesis types like Convolution etc.

ix studio wrote:

while the comparative rarity and significantly superior physical chassis / control of OASYS will make it desirabl[/i]

I think the Kronos superseded the Oasys in virtually every respect accept size and style for me , i was pondering a cheap oasys a few months back ( £2500 ) but thought i would hold back and see what Korg did with all the developments and then Kronos was announced ( it was exactly what i was hoping for - an Oasys mk2 ) .

I must say that "good, let's go for a cheap used Oasys now" was my first reaction to the Kronos.

But after I heard the EPs... not a fat chance.

Kevin's idea is correct, except that the Kronos has the "popularity" value of a stage piano as well.

That's a big market and a big source of enduring demand.

I don't know if the Oasys can tap it.

Kevin Nolan wrote:Furthermore, as no doubt Steve Jobs would point out - the 'market' often does not know what it wants. That's why companies innovate.

Actually, Steve Jobs might be right for that. And I agree with you, that's why the companies need to innovate.

People don't know what would be better between two technologies or even what a manufacture should technically do to improve a product... However, "mass market" can express what they do like or not with the current product, what and how they would like to accomplish something with the product, etc... It's called Customer Feedback.

Avid does it pretty well with ProTools and the ideascale website to summit bugs, but also features request, suggestions, etc... and anyone can vote for or against a proposition. It clearly gives a real "mass market" feedback.

During the last decade, we saw a lot of innovations with the Virtual Technologies such the VST plugins, mainly because it did allow anyone to develop the software part without having to put lot of efforts in hardware development (by using standard computer systems). They're goods and bads but we could find some very interesting solutions that weren't available by any big manufactures such Korg, Yamaha, Roland, Kurzweil, EMU, Clavia/Nord, etc...

I'm sure without stuff such Ivory, we wouldn't have 4.7 Gb piano today in the Kronos. In my honest opinion, keyboard manufactures played the little dance of tiny improvements for so long because it was really a good financial/business strategy. As long there's enough "stupid" people like you and I to buy the "new" keyboard even if it doesn't really have any new stuff except a new paint and new name and a new feature, why a manufacture wouldn't do it?

When we see the huge technology leap in computer world (even for the last 5 years) and what happened in the workstations world for the last 20 years it could be very significative and scary.

The Workstation keyboards today are NOT where they should be if the major keyboard manufactures would have follow the technology innovations progression. I don't preach for the PC architecture in the keyboard, but even in DSP or memory. i.e. Keyboard manufactures always release a keyboard with 5+ years old memory technology that by definition are already out-dated.

Let's have a look on what Yamaha, Roland and Korg did for the past 10 years?

Motif, Motif ES, Motif XS, Motif XF... no major technology leap
Fantom, Fantom-S, Fantom-X, Fantom-G... no major technology leap
Triton, Triton Studio, Triton Extreme, M3... no major technology leap

Just a recycling for old technologies, with a tiny change (such memory increase), with a new paint and a new name.

At least, the Oasys IS a major leap and I really appreciate Korg finally decides to do it. At least it looks to be a good way to follow technologies to easily include new features such Dual Core and SSD in the next keyboard (Kronos). That's a good sign for the hardware.

However, I just hope, they won't try to continue to keep this financial strategy for the software, by releasing every year only 1 or 2 new updates (it was PCM cards by the past, it's EXi, EXs, EXf today), to come to 8 to 10 possible expansions in 5 years, just before to release a new keyboard where you have to restart again.

Sadly it looks the Oasys even didn't get 10 expansions... And for the Kronos, Korg doesn't even mention any potential expansion possibilities. So I'm curious to see what will happen for the next 2 years (it will be enough significant to realize the big Korg Vision).

If they keep going the same way, this is really a bad business model, that can't work anymore today, when you can get hundreds of possible expansions with plugins, but also with third party Sample Libraries.

Today we talk about Open Labs, Music Computing, Lionstracs, Muse Research, Feeltune, Arturia, etc... They aren't really big companies, but they clearly show it is possible to come with better solutions.

Don't get me wrong, I clearly don't want to have VST on my Kronos, but I think there's an "in-between" solution. Look how Apple deal with the iPhone, the App Store, thousands of developers and hundred thousands apps... Don't tell me Korg, Yamaha or even Roland couldn't release a SDK to allow sound designers to produce and release expansions for their keyboards if they really would like.

The only reason they don't do it is because they want to keep the control... including the control of sales. $250-400 expansions cards could be a really good business. They're probably "too smart" to understand there's more money to make by using Apple strategy with a store that takes 30% on someone else's work. They don't do the job (it saves R&D time & cost), they don't do innovations and they still get money. And the best part, the more third party do, the more interesting and attractive your platform becomes. And that's how you also get more fidelity from the customers, that don't want to switch from brand to brand everytime there's a new innovation. If you can buy some expansions in the Kronos today, and you could buy a new Kronos 2, let's say 5 years from now, but you can still use all the new synth and samples libraries you bought in 5 years, you'll more tempted to not switch for a Yam, Kurz or Roland keyboard. I do have 350+ apps for my iPhone and I even don't consider to buy any other phone... even if I do know that Android might have a better phone.

No rocket science to figure it out... IMHO, Korg is the best manufacture today to be able to make this happen with what I call the kOS (Korg OS on Oasys and Kronos). The kOS foundations are rock solid, stable, owned (no use of Windows or OS X), based on PC Architecture (which won't disappear anytime soon), ready for Touchscreen, and Open for future improvements, and enough background to create a real fidelity from customers.

So, Mr. Korg, you do have all cards in your hand to make great things and great business for the future... don't screw it up.

My long 2 cents,
Phil

SpIdErWeB wrote:
....

Don't get me wrong, I clearly don't want to have VST on my Kronos, but I think there's an "in-between" solution. Look how Apple deal with the iPhone, the App Store, thousands of developers and hundred thousands apps... Don't tell me Korg, Yamaha or even Roland couldn't release a SDK to allow sound designers to produce and release expansions for their keyboards if they really would like.

....

Phil

SpIdErWeB,

That's a very cool and interesting idea - something Korg may have thought of already but I think it is worth breaking out and putting into a separate post as a wishlist item.

It would be awesome to have third party sound designers creating natively for Korg using an SDK. Perhaps the import functionality and store for purchasing the additional sounds or synthesis engines could be bolted right on to the computer editor program.

I would be willing to pay "a little" extra for sounds natively imported into the board vs. what i would pay directly to the sound designers for their standalone box versions. This premium, in addition to savings of not having to ship a box unit and distribution to ready and willing customers should be enough to offset a percentage that Korg would take of the sales from the sound designers (which Korg rightfully would deserve for putting development effort into the SDK and OS and editor enhancements Korg would need to make in order to support it). Korg could open a new revenue stream and still have steady innovation to its boards. As apple has proved with its model, Korg would proceed as usual with its R&D creating upgraded hardware and additional synthesis engines, buying out one man shops that create truly innovative add ons that Korg wants to own the IP of and include in all of its future machines.

I would even be willing to donate some limited funds to start it - think Kickstarter www.kickstarter.com

Hi rkuli,

My comment wasn't mean to start a new thread, but it could be now (if a modo wants to split my long post to create a thread, please do it )

There's ton of things that could be done with the Kronos. Korg could even released an USB-Wifi kit in option, to plug it to the Kronos and go directly to the Store from the keyboard interface.

Or, include the store access in the Editor. The same way I can buy music or app directly from itunes on my computer or on my iPhone.

The Apple 30% eco-system generates great profit for both Apple and developers. Since there's no box, no distribution, no physical support, no payment commission, etc... it's actually a good deal for the developers. And Apple is still making 30% by doing nothing (well, almost nothing, because they still take care of the hosting, bandwidth, payment system, etc...)

Korg could stay focus to develop the hardware platform, the OS and the SDK (with the API required to create expansions). For instance, KARO would be a great candidate to release their sample libraries as native expansions for the kOS devices (Oasys/Kronos).

That way, they could enjoy the benefit of SSD and VMT for the Streaming for instance, and Korg will be assured the Libraries will be conformed to their expectations to be sure it will work the way it's designed to work.

That's not something you will ever get with VST, even on a Linux platform. That's why, I think Korg is the only manufacture (TODAY) that could be doing that, and it could be a great success. Well, at least I do believe it

Phil

Kevin Nolan wrote:...
... They stopped innovating synthesizers, electric pianos and all round in electric and electronic music instruments at the EX5. The classics I mentioned came from a desire to be innovative within Yamaha and that made them a very exciting company with astounding instruments that affected the face of music. None of that happens today.

How much those synths cost in today's economy? Would those be in reach of an average musician/hobbyist/enthusiast?

Kevin Nolan wrote:...
What saddens me the most about Yamaha in particular is that they have massive resources - and - they still have incredible knowhow through their pianos, disklavier, silent range, digital mixers and yes the excellent Tyros. If only they'd bring some of that expertise to synthesizers in earnest; they above all other companies could change the game for synthesizers, as they used to.

They do have a lot of resources, maybe ten times they had when they where innovating, that's why they have to be careful developing new production lines.

Kevin Nolan wrote:...I had hoped that OASYS / Kronos would have motivated Yamaha and Roland to engage the synthesizer/ workstation market with real earnest; but perhaps that's just wishful thinking. Certainly within Yamaha there seems to be a blanket declaration to _not_ be involved in synthesizers.

Yamaha and Roland and everybody waited to see market reaction to Oasys, it wasn't a market success, maybe to expensive, maybe overkill solution for a simple problem.

Kevin Nolan wrote:...But the suggestion that Tyros/PRS and Motif exist because it what masses want in a sad indictment on Yamaha, and on the masses / market for that matter. How incredibly drab. Is that the sorry state of music in the wider population? And - reliability should be a given, not a goal in itself. Are you suggesting that no innovation needs to happen - we've covered it all? Synthesizers mean new approaches to music - and it seems that Yamaha in particular is run by managers who do not understand that point (but all companies, including Korg, struggle with this premise in my opinion - even with OASYS/Kronos, we're nowhere near where we could/should be if all synthesizer companies innovated the way they used to).

o no, don't get me wrong, innovation needs to happen, but the big guy is not necessary going to risk it. And even though reliability should be a given, we know that not every device is ready for 'hard use'.

ozy wrote:...
market NEVER generate innovation.

NOBODY among end users ever dreamt, much less DEMANDED, for a 50 bucks 3G phone with video, which is now something 10-year-old kids use.

Ok, maybe 15000 managers, 1300 nerds and 23 secret agents really ASKED for it.

But the MILLIONS cell phones were SOLD to the public AFTER having beeing created by industries.

It was not response to a demand. It was courage to induce the public to use a totally new idea...

When Apple entered the mobile phone arena, the big three laugh at Jobs, saying he has no idea of what a mobile phone should. RIM, Motorola and specially Nokia rejected the iPhone as a serious competition. Now they are trying to copy/innovate from it success, Nokia was last one to adapt and they are struggling after being leaders for so many years.

What I'm trying to say is, small companies are more susceptible to take innovation risks. They need to.

Korg is taking huge risks here, that's why they flood you with the "The game is changed" campaign. Everybody is talking about Kronos and just a few have even touched it. There's no doubt it looks like a wonderful machine on paper and if Kronos sells well there would certainly be a answer from Roland and Yamaha. My guess is that R & Y are waiting for sales numbers.