Every year the High End Society has a ‘Newcomers’ stand where they give exhibition space to a few, very lucky, new companies and products.  We always take a great interest in this area as it really shows the future of the industry.  Several success stories have come out of the Newcomers stand at High End Munich over the years, among them PureAudioProject, Westminster Labs and b.audio, to name just a few.

Here are the High End Newcomers 2018…we hope to be seeing much more of them very soon, hopefully exhibiting again at High End Munich 2019!

Little Zoe

Little Zoe from Greece were showcasing their first valve amplifier.  The amp, shown in Jaguar white, was definitely very attractive and looked like it meant business. The standard configuration of the amp includes Lundahl output transformers and Mundorf Silver Oil signal capacitors. It has a solid, non-resonant, fibred resin chassis to dampen noises in the mass of the body.

Little Zoe hope to begin shipping their amplifier around the end of September 2018, retail price will be 14,000€ and it can be supplied in various custom colour car paint finishes. However, they have a pre-order offer on the first 20 amps in black or white at 9,000€ until the end of September.

ONKK

ONKK are a British turntable manufacturer set up by Paul Beckett in 2015. The company has a long term focus, having tooled all the manufactured components and developed a proprietary motion control and slot-less direct drive system. Their turntable is also very out of the ordinary and contemporary in it’s design.

On show was their flagship Cue DD turntable, which is the culmination of five years’ research and development. Cast in Aluminium and finished in bright red it was very eye-catching and Paul said that he had already had a lot of interest, particularly from the Chinese market.

Audiodinamica

We met Gianluca from Audiodinamica of Italy, who were showing their very petite, but solid, and very colourful BeCube electronics. Currently in development, the BeCubes will be launching in September/October 2018 on Kickstarter.

Their BeCube Power is the power supply for the BeCube DAC, BeCube Line amp and BeCube Phono. Together they will build a fresh and modern looking system.

Wing Acoustics

Mike and Dave Palmer, two brothers from New Zealand, claim that they are the inventors of the world’s first zero-resonance speakers.

Their Acoustic Wing drivers, which they were showing for both home audio loudspeakers and headphones looked completely different to anything we had seen before and they generate sound by moving in a rigid action.

Fascinating to see a different approach to driver design and one to watch to see where they go with this in the future.

Arya Audio Labs

Based in Southampton, UK and founded by Arthur Marker, Arya Audio Labs were showing prototypes of their very interesting looking Airblade Driver.

Rather than using a heavy diaphragm with separate voice coil, the AirBlade transducer incorporates light-weight ring-shaped foil elements arranged in layers with conductive Aluminium traces directly bonded to it. When an electrical signal is applied, opposite layers of the diaphragm either move towards or away from each other depending on the direction of the signal thus moving air and creating sound.

They also had their Revopod damping foot on display.

Holz-Akustik

Unfortunately there was no one available to speak to us, from German brand Holz-Akustik, when we visited the Newcomers stand. They make what looks like some very nice, wooden Hifi Racks and stands.

Read all the High End Munich 2018 coverage here!