Following an initial launch in Europe, Blaze Audio announced its formal entry into the professional audio market throughout North America. As a subsidiary of Pascal A/S of Copenhagen, Denmark—the leading supplier of amplifier electronics for the global AV market—Blaze Audio enters the field with its PowerZone Connect series of fully matrixed, DSP loaded network power amplifier products. PowerZone amplifiers enable extensive and intuitive control from a wide range of smart devices, including phones, tablets, and laptop computers. The result is the ability to deliver commercial simplicity through product flexibility at competitive price points.
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Blaze Audio’s North American operations are spearheaded by Kevin Wilkin, who serves as the company’s executive sales director for North America. Wilkin reflected on the opportunities he envisions for the new company, “Blaze Audio is Pascal’s own commercial brand of audio products with the excellent design and build quality one would expect from this proven industry leader. As Pascal amplifier technology has long served the top audio manufacturers the company OEMs for, Blaze Audio amplifiers carry both the credibility and the value proposition necessary to become a major commercial and pro audio provider. We see a market that is ripe with opportunity and are eager to charge forward.”
Blaze Audio is on a mission to partner with AV integrators by delivering value that is meaningful to their operations. Part of that value is providing quality commercial audio products with innovative features and flexible operation. “We simplify the integrator’s design and project management loads by engineering in a way that enables fewer products to cover more types of install applications,” Wilkin explained. “This approach lets system integrators and distributors manage fewer models while simplifying design, service, support, stocking, in and out-bound ordering, plus logistics. We aim to become the easiest and most supportive manufacturer for AV integrators to do business with.”
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The PowerZone Connect series of power amplifiers are easy to program and facilitate extensive control over the audio. A Wi-Fi router is designed into each product and is immediately accessible to any smart device or laptop with the right credentials. With the goal of constantly expanding the products’ functionality, the latest PowerZone Connect firmware update adds modules/drivers for major third-party control platforms. Equally notable, PowerZone amps can now take many loudspeaker manufacturer’s EQ presets and load them into the amplifier’s DSP settings. These capabilities streamline system configurations in ways that are unmatched in the industry.
As for the market channels envisioned by Blaze Audio management, Wilkin offered the following thoughts, “Blaze Audio amplifiers make a compelling choice anywhere loudspeakers are deployed. I’m confident our amps can provide great return on investment for commercial applications such as retail environments, restaurants, bars, houses of worship, educational facilities, and corporate meeting/training rooms to name just a few. The extensive control made possible by the PowerZone Connect series amps will enable these products to be deployed in applications we haven’t yet considered.”
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As Blaze Audio ramps up its presence in North America, there is consensus among the various team members that the company is well positioned for success. “There are very few opportunities in the U.S. to take a company of Blaze Audio’s pedigree and build it from start-up mode to market share leader,” Wilkin noted. “I find great satisfaction in pioneering new projects where I can look back and see how far we’ve come. It’s a wonderful feeling to be able to make a difference and have a positive impact—and everyone in the company is of this mindset. I should also note that, here in the U.S., we have one of the industry’s premier loudspeaker designers leading our loudspeaker engineering efforts. Without getting too far ahead of myself, consider this: combine that bit of information with the power of Pascal’s amplifier module designs and you have a formidable new player in the pro audio space. Rest assured you’ll be hearing a lot more from Blaze Audio.”
