Sennheiser CEO: Beats fashion headphones will 'never go away'
In this interview, CNET talks to Daniel Sennheiser on the challenge of building headphones in a post-Beats world.
Last year I had the chance to interview Luke Wood, the boss of Beats headphones, about the bass-heavy company's meteoric rise to prominence -- a fashion-focused bombardment that left traditional audio companies struggling to keep pace. This year, at the IFA trade show in Berlin, Daniel Sennheiser of German firm Sennheiser is having his say.
Sennheiser is one of the many manufacturers caught off guard by the popularity of Beats' celebrity-endorsed fashion 'phones. I wanted to know how the company was coping with the competition, and the challenges of selling headphones in a post-Beats world.
'Beats has taken away a sizeable chunk'
My first question for Daniel, CEO of the family-owned-and-run business, is whether Dr Dre and his celebrity cohorts have stolen sales from Sennheiser.
"Yeah, we have seen in certain markets that Beats has taken away a sizeable chunk," Daniel admits, going on to describe that the particular market affected is the "premium fashion-driven headphones. And they've done that very successfully."
Read the rest of 'Sennheiser CEO on fashion 'phones, and battling Beats' at CNET UK