In an unprecedented gesture of good will, Yamaha Corporation and its President, Takuya Nakata, have granted possession of the Sequential brand back to its original owner and company founder, Dave Smith. “To say that I’m grateful would be putting it mildly,” said Smith. “Generosity at this level is almost unheard of in today’s corporate climate.” Like the other pioneering American synthesizer manufacturers of the late 1970’s and 80’s, Moog and Oberheim, Sequential’s fortunes declined when digital instruments eclipsed their analog counterparts. All three company founders subsequently lost the rights to their own company name. When Sequential ceased operations in 1987, its name and assets were acquired by Yamaha. For a number of years following that, Smith worked as a consultant for Yamaha and Korg, and was largely responsible for Korg’s successful Wavestation series of vector-synthesis-based instruments. Instrumental in restoring the Sequential name was Roland’s Founder, Ikutaro Kakehashi, a longtime colleague and friend of Smith’s. “I feel that it’s important to get rid of unnecessary conflict among electronic musical instrument companies,” said Kakehashi. “That is exactly the spirit of MIDI. For this reason, I personally recommended that the President of Yamaha, Mr. Nakata, return the rights to the Sequential name to Dave Smith. And I’m glad to see such a wonderful result—a new product with the Sequential name.”
Posted on: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 00:05:09 +0000