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Yesterdays (March 11th, 2016) Sonos Anouncment

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Not as much talk about yesterdays sonos anouncment as I would have expected from such a passionate community. So what are people thinking?

Obviously Amazon Echo has impacted SONOS but how do you go from hiring new people and planning a retail store to cutting staff?

What's next ? Should we be concered about making more current investments in sonos hardware (I really want to buy a sub)?

People have been posting for months about voice support and for years about DTS.

The standard response is sonos doesn't comment on future enhancements or new products.

We know what we have today and there pretty darn good products but we all want to be excited and look forward to what's coming next.

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K

Kumar

Echo sales are apparently denting Play:1 sales pretty badly, at least that's my thought as to why Sonos is suddenly having to change their strategy.

I am not very familiar with the product hence the question: While I understand that Echo has voice control, can one place a few units around the home and do all that can be done with an identical number of 1 units? Via streaming services as well as a local library, with the same level of stability in music play?

And is the sound quality in the same ball park, allowing things like stereo pairing? Presumably at this time there is no Sub?

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chicks

Echo sales are apparently denting Play:1 sales pretty badly, at least that's my thought as to why Sonos is suddenly having to change their strategy.

I am not very familiar with the product hence the question: While I understand that Echo has voice control, can one place a few units around the home and do all that can be done with an identical number of 1 units? Via streaming services as well as a local library, with the same level of stability in music play?

And is the sound quality in the same ball park, allowing things like stereo pairing? Presumably at this time there is no Sub?

No, Echo doesn't compete in SQ or multiroom. However, the Play:1 was, until recently, the #1 selling home wifi speaker, ideal for those who were moving up from bluetooth speakers. Suddenly, the Echo is a runaway bestseller, can play Pandora, etc, and has cool voice control and home automation, all for $20 less than the Play:1. It's getting all the press in the same publications where consumers used to read about how good Sonos is, like the highly influential Consumer Reports. Plenty of consumers who were saving up for a Play:1 are now buying Echos instead.

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K

Kumar

Yes, but Echo is then a dead end, if more units are to be added across the home and played in sync? Even where they are to be played as independent zones, will they do this as well as Sonos can, as distances from the WiFi router increase as they would for other rooms?

The standalone speaker market really isn't a Sonos domain, even if the nature of the play 1 units allowed that to be accessed for a while. Why the sudden attraction to it then?

I can understand the need for Sonos to be a better user experience for the streaming services user, but having to add voice to compete with Echo seems to be knee jerk reflex.

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T

The LHC

If you read the billboard article it's because Sonos are hearing lots of people talk about voice control. It might be a distant third to you but not the general public it appears.

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mwiseman

Enthusiast II

The sales figures don't back that up.

What are the sales figures?

They're the number of units an item has sold but that's not important right now!

Sorry, couldn't resist that...

Okay, but don't call me Shirley!

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nicka99

Local Superstar

a new high profile departure...
http://www.engadget.com/2016/03/28/sonos-product-head-marc-whitten-has-left-the-company/

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GreenI

Avid Contributor I

One idea, as I read through this thread - is why would Sonos stick with a single voice control and/or home automation system, they haven't taken this approach with streaming services ... they support many.

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Paulw123

Virtuoso

Isn't that another problem, trying to support everything out there from BBC, audible, amazon prime music, seems to cause most complaints on here when services change and sonos can't keep up. Amazon Echo haven't got to keep up with what apple are doing etc etc

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jgatie

One idea, as I read through this thread - is why would Sonos stick with a single voice control and/or home automation system, they haven't taken this approach with streaming services ... they support many.

Actually, Sonos standardized on a single Music Partners API for music services to use. It is only when services go outside the API or have other non-standard requirements when things go awry (BBC, Audible, Spotify). Echo/Alexa technology is made available to incorporate into other hardware, letting third parties use Alexa as a standardized voice UI interface. This is exactly like the Music Partners API, except instead of reinventing the wheel, Sonos would be using the already available Alexa API.

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GreenI

Avid Contributor I

Yes, Sonos could use the Amazon/Alexa API ... but what about Apple? Google most likely in the future too.
Or they could publish their own (Voice Partner API).... but would Amazon/Apple/Goole want to also code to Sonos' API.

I work in an IT company, and we see this all of the time ... do I use your API, or do you use mine?

Most likely (as with the Music Partners API) they might have to support multiple versions to get the broadest reach - as this may be in their best commercial interests rather than tying to a single voice control technology/partner. Other players like Spotify, Deezer etc may also feel a need to step into this field to ensure relevance.

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