Company Profile: Pequod Acoustics

It seems hard to believe that it was only a year ago that Pro AVL Asia visited the Pequod Acoustics headquarters situated in the verdant, rolling hills above Florence. The Italian speaker manufacturer was riding high after a successful launch event at Prolight + Sound Frankfurt 2019 and had a defined road map for further expansion and high-profile partnerships. Toasts were made to the future. Then, barely a few months later, the pandemic struck.

Despite the havoc wreaked by Covid-19, one has to question what initially led brothers Andrea and Simone Ugolini to enter such a crowded, highly competitive marketplace in 2016. Both men were independently successful in their own fields, Andrea owning a structural engineering studio handling civil, military and government construction, while Simone was the CEO of the family’s well-established construction firm. Yet, away from the day-to-day business, Andrea had always held a deep-rooted, personal passion for high-end audio and had become increasingly frustrated by what was available to consumers. Together with Simone, he felt that they could change that landscape and, after some trial and error experiments and subsequent positive results, the brothers decided to take their passion to the next level with the creation of Pequod Acoustics. Not long after, the pair coined the term "Hi-Pro speakers”.

“This is the synthesis of what we do,” explains Andrea, who acts as the company’s chief technical officer. “We blend together the best of pro audio and hi-fi worlds. We have linear and accurate high-fidelity sound reproduction paired with the high SPL needed for professional audio.”

This, he feels, is what sets Pequod apart from the rest of the pack. “The concept and approach are totally different. A lot of other companies use the sentence ‘no compromises’ but, here, it’s really true. Everything is made in Italy and the choice of components, the methods of constructing the speakers, the research into sound perfection – it’s all at the highest level. The outer design of the products is sound-driven and is something unique in the world.”

One only has to look at the current product line-up to appreciate how that ingrained passion has turned into a commercial reality. At that Frankfurt show in 2019, the philosophy clearly paid dividends, drawing a crowd of visitors to the booth to witness the enormous Shockwave three-way, horn-loaded system – with its 112cm-diameter mid-bass horn –working in tandem with the huge horn-loaded Hydra Super Sub.

“It was amazing; everyone was looking at us as the newest and coolest brand,” recalls Simone, Pequod’s chief executive manager. “We captured their attention and I think the market was ready for a new brand that manufactured something quite different from just another black box.”

While the horn’s huge size enables proper sound reproduction at certain frequencies, the visual aspect of the range cannot be understated and is definitely a crowd puller. “You can't hide this kind of massive speaker,” admits Andrea, “so why not incorporate the bright colour as part of the club’s general design?”

Yet, from an acoustic perspective, the CTO is keen to elaborate on what the Pequod designs offer compared to more traditional models. “Almost every existing and future product from us uses horn-loaded technology,” he continues. “Without revealing too much about the type of horns we use, we are able to create a much more dynamic range than our competitors, as well as very consistent polar pattern dispersion with extremely high phase coherence. Furthermore, they produce almost zero sound reproduction at the back of the horns.”

An additional characteristic is the bespoke design of Pequod’s passive crossovers, constructed using high-quality components, which Andrea claims is impossible to obtain with standard DSP. “They really increase the clarity and quality of playback to really lifelike levels and, furthermore, you only need a two-channel amplifier to drive a couple of our three-way systems.

“Our systems are really plug-and-play,” he furthers. “They sound good immediately and you don't need to struggle with complicated software or DSP presets. Only minimal corrections are needed according to the environment. More importantly, everyone from an audio guru to a clubber hears good and nice sound, with no ear fatigue. Another important aspect that makes us different from many other manufacturers is the high-grade IP rating of all our products. They can be installed or used in marine-grade environments, or outdoor in any temperature or weather condition. Plus, the composite and resins we use are fireproof-certified.”

The advantage of being an independent, artisanal company has clearly provided Pequod with much-needed flexibility during the challenges of 2020. “We are a small but very well-financed company,” says Simone. “We don't have hundreds or thousands of employees on the payroll and our streamlined structure has enabled us to not just survive this pandemic but also, albeit at a slower rate, continue growing.”

From those heady days when Pequod was simply a research project focused on “pursuing perfect audio reproduction with high SPL”, to the tipping point, where the business moved into the commercial domain, the brothers recognised that they needed to take the business to the next level. The appointment of industry veteran Leonardo Dani as chief sales officer was crucial to the company’s development. “Leo was the perfect candidate to help us with this transition,” attests Simone. “With his experience, he offered us multiple points of view: cost analysis, target prices, competitor comparisons and not least his clear picture of a brand establishment strategy demonstrating sustainable growth.”

Dani joined following senior roles at Outline Audio, APIA and K-array, with a wealth of experience developing overseas markets. While that background is serving him well as he introduces Pequod to the wider market, he’s understandably cautious about which segments will now present the most opportunities. “Before the pandemic, I would have said fixed installations in clubs and restaurants were the target, but now I don't know if the club market will ever come back to past levels,” he says. “However, luxury home entertainment installation is another important market for us. We’ll see how the global scenario will evolve in the future, and we can and will react accordingly.”

Immediately after PL+S 2019, Dani had thrown himself into developing Pequod’s distribution network and Asia was the first port of call, with exclusive distribution rights given to Vanlam Audio Equipments in Vietnam, quickly followed by Guangzhou Dardankings Audio Equipment in China. While these tie-ups have followed traditional distribution models, Dani acknowledges that different countries can operate more effectively in different ways.

“We have used an alternative approach in Singapore, selling systems via friends for three different clubs: the Riverhause at Clarke; 1 Altitude, a 63rd-floor rooftop club in the financial district; and the new 1-VÜ club on Sentosa Island.” Further possibilities include Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Mauritius, but understandably the pandemic has put those conversations on hold.

The network of contacts that Dani has cultivated over the years is proving profitable in terms of some very high-profile collaborations with the likes of fashion brand Burberry and Italian DJ Benny Benassi. In typical low-key style, he sums this up in three words: “network, luck and design. The range immediately sparked the interest of fashion and event designers as well as artists, and we’re getting very good results. I'm working hard to make new partnerships, and now there’s a domino effect happening involving famous brands from other markets.”

Product development is not slowing down either. “Our upcoming horn-loaded Polyphemus will be the biggest product we have launched,” reveals Andrea. “After that, we intend to release the new and very uncommon triple 18-inch Cebero subwoofer. Our challenge now is to find the right amplifier to drive it because of the large amount of power it requires. But we are already working on this issue and we will find a solution soon.”

To complete the hat trick, Pequod will focus on the fixed-install bar/restaurant market with a new 5-inch coaxial model similar in design to Kona but which can equally be used in a home studio setup when coupled with a small 10-inch sub or as a computer conference system for home offices or small boardrooms, coupled with a microphone. “This 5-inch speaker has enabled us to plan for a new cooperation with an important brand from a market outside of pro audio,” discloses Dani. “If we are able to close the deal, it will be the most important act of co-marketing and co-branding in my career.”

As the company looks ahead, the owners are also reflective about the journey that they have undertaken and lessons learnt. “We knew that this market wasn’t going to be simple but we didn't expect that it would be so crowded and that there would be so much work just getting the attention of clients,” admits Andrea. “Product presentation, the website and our marketing has been changed twice already. Finding partners also wasn’t as easy as we had expected, but we’re learning quickly in order to do the right things in the future.”

Concurring with his brother, Simone adds: “The pandemic has slowed down our market expansion a bit and removed precious resources from our R&D programme. But we feel we’re in a better position than other brands. We will be ready as soon as the markets start responding and asking for products again. We feel that our future will be bright and positive.”

This article appears in the November - December edition of Pro AVL Asia. Subscribe at www.proavl-central.com/subscribe/asia