HFN: What is the most difficult part in designing a new headphone?
MG: At the end of the day, it is the integration and balance of all components. Due to its size, a headphone isn’t a product where acoustics, design, and mechanics can be considered separately. The design and materials influence the acoustics, the acoustics influence the design, and the mechanics finally define what is possible or not. This is the real challenge within a headphone: everything has to come together to have a great product.
HFN: You are launching a new Bluetooth headphone, Aventho wireless. It comes with a very cool and interesting feature: integrated sound personalization. Can you give us a little insight on that? How does it work and what does it do for the listener?
MG: Sometimes innovations are achieved with little steps, and sometimes the steps are bigger. Aventho wireless is definitely one of the bigger ones!
Our vision was to create modern headphones. Headphones that can be intelligent and adapt to you, by implementing Bluetooth HD and DSP-based Sound Personalization.
We were very lucky to collaborate with a company out of the audiology field, dealing with the question of how audio reproduction can be adjusted to the differences of personal hearing, with a scientific background. We’re collaborating with Mimi Hearing Technologies, based in Berlin, Germany and we managed to incorporate their technology within our headphones. This enables us to find out about the personal hearing of every customer, just thanks to a 6-minute hearing test with our headphone and the complimentary App we deliver for free. This information can be permanently stored on the headphone and we adjust the sound reproduction to the personal hearing of every user.
This is fantastic, as until now everybody got the same sound, no matter how their personal hearing was working. When compared to glasses, this is quite unbelievable as we are used to the fact that everybody has his/her personal pair of glasses adjusted to their personal ability of seeing. This is perfectly normal and common. Why isn’t that happening when it comes to sound and hearing? That was the question we were dealing with, together with Mimi Hearing Technologies. So we ended up with a solution where you can permanently customize and adapt the sound reproduction of our headphones right to the ability of your personal hearing. Just as if you were getting the right pair of glasses.
HFN: How do you see the audiophile market in the future?
MG: I was invited to be a speaker at a very interesting “Expert Panel Discussion” during Rocky Mountain Audio Fest in Denver, Colorado. The topic was: “Innovations in portable audio”. The conclusion, after discussing with colleagues from Sony, Audeze, Hifiman, etc. was the following: until now, the audiophile world has been a quite protected and traditional world, where the best audio experience was always exclusive to analog devices with cabled connectivity. With the development of new technologies in the last years (such as Qualcomm aptX HD), digital connectivity (wired and wireless) comes into the picture and is able to deliver the same audio quality while being able to deliver additional benefit.” So it’s not about compromising on best audio quality… but it is about letting in new technologies that can add benefit to the “classic” audiophile experience.
HFN: What is the future of headphones?
MG: I believe that, in the future, headphones will increasingly evolve from being a playback device into being a connection device. We have to “connect” our ears to the modern smart devices in the best possible way. And our challenge is to not sacrifice audio quality on the way.
HFN: How do you as European think the local market differs from the Asian or American market?
MG: I’ve travelled the world quite a lot and I can really see some differences in the markets.
The Europeans are always looking for the “best bang for the buck” as they are very price-sensitive and used to getting good products. They will also often compare technical data of different products to make a choice.
The Americans are much more trend-oriented. If something is considered cool, they rely on this and go for it… but you first have to create that reputation of your product.
The Asians (in the high-end market) trust the Europeans, especially Germans, to have outstanding products. “Made in Germany” is an important tag but you also have to deliver. If you do so, you will be very successful. If you don’t… you will move out of the picture pretty fast.
HFN: Streaming, locally stored files or physical copies, what is your favourite and why?
MG: My personal favorite is still locally stored files. I know that this is kind of old fashioned as streaming services have a much bigger offer but since I’m travelling quite a lot, this is just convenient for me. I like to have my music with me, no matter where I am.
HFN: Your Xelento IEM was very successful, especially in Asia. Are there more dynamic driver IEMs in this class we can look forward to?
MG: Yes, definitely! Xelento was a counterpoint to the trend of packing as many balanced armature drivers as possible into a bulky earphone. We wanted to prove that you can have an equal or even better sound experience with just a single high dynamic driver. And we did! According to reviews and experts in the market, Xelento is considered a game changer in the IEM world. And maybe this is just the beginning…
HFN: What is your favourite Digital Audio Player, earphone and headphone?
MG: My favorite Digital Audio Player is still my iPhone because I constantly have it with me, so that’s just convenient to me. I take care though to have my audio files in very good audio quality on it. Regarding earphones, I am addicted to our Xelento. I’m still amazed how we managed to get this perfect match between wearing comfort and great sound quality. Sometimes products just turn out to be magic.
In terms of headphones, my new love is our Aventho wireless that travels with me all over the world since a couple of weeks ago and is making me neglect my Xelento a little bit…
HFN: What’s your personal favourite album?
MG: I have to admit that I am a bit “old school” and very much connected to classic rock. Queen and Led Zeppelin are something I could always listen to… also, Pink Floyd’s “Dark side of the moon“ and ”The Wall“ are some of my favourites of all time, with “Comfortably Numb“ being my favorite song. By the way… did I mention that I play in a Pink Floyd Tribute band?
Thank you very much Mario for being part of our series! We wish you and beyerdynamic the best of luck and are looking forward to more exciting products from Heilbronn!
Now here’s Mario’s favourite track on YouTube and TIDAL for you to listen.
https://listen.tidal.com/track/55391466
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7EpSirtf_E
