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The story
Founded by Ernst Pless and Rudolf Görike in 1947, in Vienna.1
History
The company was founded in Vienna, Austria in 1947 by two Viennese scientists: physicist Rudolf Görike and engineer Ernst Pless.
Originally, its main business was to provide technical equipment for cinemas: loudspeakers, film projectors and light meters. The business slowly expanded and AKG started selling car horns, door intercoms, carbon microphone capsules for telephones, headsets and cushion speakers.
About this time, the company developed its first patents, the moving coil technology and the principle of mass load membranes, allowing its products to have extended frequency ranges.
With the creation of the D12 microphone in 1953, AKG achieved international fame, setting the standard for voice transmissions. It possessed excellent sonic qualities for that time, making its way into radio stations and recording studios from across the world. The product was improved through subsequent upgrades, spanning the famous C414 and C12 microphones.
By the end of the 1970s and into the 1980s magnetic cartridges were produced, such as the P25 in 1982.
In 1984, AKG became a public company, listed on the Vienna stock exchange. As a blue chip company, it was one of the most traded stocks.
The company was acquired by the American company Harman International Industries in 1994. By this time, AKG's United States subsidiary had been established (in Los Angeles in 1985). AKG Acoustics USA, still headquartered in the San Fernando Valley, also houses regional offices for Crown Audio, another Harman Industries subsidiary.
In 2010, the company received the prestigious Technical Grammy award.
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In 2016 it was announced that the AKG Vienna facilities (headquarters, manufacturing, and engineering) would be shut down in 2017, with a transfer of brand headquarters to California, USA.
Most current AKG-branded products are made in Harman's overseas production facilities.
In 2017, Samsung Electronics acquired Harman. In the same year, a group of former AKG engineers based in Austria formed Austrian Audio, competing with AKG.
Timeline
1945 – Rudolf Görike and Ernst Pless begin supplying film equipment to theatres in post-war Vienna.
1949 – AKG founded by Görike and Pless as Akustische und Kino-Geräte Gesellschaft m.b.H.
1949 – AKG begins producing headphones, the first model being the K120 DYN.
1953 – introduces the world's first dynamic cardioid microphone
1955 – founds a German subsidiary
1985 – founds a U.S. subsidiary, based in Northridge, Los Angeles, California
1991 – produces its first wireless microphones, the WMS100 and WMS900
1994 – becomes part of Harman International Industries
2006 – produces a limited 60th anniversary edition of the celebrated C414 LTD microphone.
2010 – AKG Acoustics received a Grammy Award for the work the company has done in the recording field. Dinesh Paliwal, the current chief executive officer, picked up the award on behalf of the company.
2010 – AKG announces a partnership with Quincy Jones to manufacture a signature line of headphones featuring stylized designs and modified drivers.
2012 – AKG announces its partnership with disc jockey Tiësto to start manufacturing headphones under Tiësto's name.
2016 – Harman decided to shut down all facilities in Vienna in 2017.
2017 – Harman was bought by Samsung Electronics.
2017 – Headquarters of the AKG brand is transferred to California, United States
From Wikipedia’s article on AKG (company), shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5