Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1541612
32 W I N T E R 2 0 2 6 I C A S Q U A R T E R L Y we offer, it is to give a tool, a quality assurance tool for those people who are making audio. And that is what you also can see from the mission of the company; it is our job to offer the best possible quality for those people. And that has been the core of what we do from the beginning, since 1978. That principle is still there." Jussi Vaisanen adds, "Of course, we try to solve the users' problems. As I mentioned in the demo, the room is affecting a lot of the sound and speakers. The room also affects [where] you can place the monitors. So, we provide software tools and the control and calibration for the monitors so the user can easily and quickly get proper calibration and room correction and use that in our speakers. And of course, nowadays, we are providing a lot of different tools. This report code grade allows the user to analyze the room and all information about the room. So basically, we are inventing new things to help customers and users solve the problems that they have from acoustics to the control end." Siamak Naghian adds, "If you look at a typical situation where people do their job, the main question for them is, can I have a tool that I can trust? We make sure that the tools we provide offer neutral sound. Which part of this sound is okay, which part of it is not? And now if you look at the whole process, what are those different factors that are having an impact on the whole outcome of your work from the material? And then the next phase is that you put a loudspeaker in the room. And that was what Jussi was saying, you have to consider the room as part of the reproduction system, and then you have to take care of the room. If the room is designed acoustically, okay, you have better possibilities. But then we also offer a calibration system to measure your room, to compensate for that. The basic starting point is that you have a good monitor. Additionally, users should know the environment where they're using that monitor. And because of that, we are doing the other two to support the same purpose. But the purpose has always been similar—to offer the neutral sound that people can trust when they do their job. That's the core of what we have." So, what exactly does Genelec sell with their products besides the mentioned software? They sell confidence, neutrality, and trust. Siamak Naghian continues: "What kind of perception you expect or what kind of perception you may get, that's its own area. But that is also the main reason we have been focusing on professional audio because what professionals expect isn't whether they like or don't like something—they want to trust in the tool that they have. We give that. This is the reference, then you can choose what you want to do because when you go to the perceptional side, it is more of a talk about psychoacoustics. And it depends on what people are used to and how much they really know about their own hearing capabilities and so on." Jussi Vaisanen adds, "It is always nice to hear direct feedback from the users when they are saying that they are able to do their work faster because all the details can be heard very well and they can trust the system." Siamak Naghian agrees. "Because of that, it's very different from if you listen to people who are professionals and use our products for their own work. For them, it's clear what they are expecting. But then for those people who are [into], for example, Hi-Fi, listening for pleasure, their expectation is different. They may come up with whether this sound is 'warm,' etc. And with that, you have a very complicated subject that depends on the material that you are using. It depends on the room that you have. It depends on everything. But for us, the main principle is that, at a minimum, the listener has the right monitor." THE PHILOSOPHY AND CULTURE I read through a book Genelec had given me commemorating the 40th anniversary of the company which provided a lot of context regarding their company philosophy. But my interviews really painted the picture of the outlook and goals that must be on their minds day in and day out. Siamak Naghian broke it down this way. "I'm very interested in the company and how it is connected to society and not only because of social responsibility. But the roots of the company are very important, and I think that Genelec would be very different if it was not in Finland. I'm not saying that it would have been less good, but just very different because those principles that we have been focusing on are because of the roots of the company." Something many may not know is that everyone in Finland has access to nature. That may sound trivial, but they truly do. They know they are entitled to it, and they actually use this access. There are so many forests and so many lakes so that nature is on everyone's doorstep. It's common to have a mökki (summer cottage) in the family. And you don't need to be wealthy to have this. And if you by chance don't have a mökki of your own, publicly accessible forest and hiking trails and saunas by the lake are available to everyone. And I don't mean needing to be on a waiting list or the often-crowded types of nature access. I'm talking remote, secluded, quiet, public parts of nature for all to enjoy. This was on my mind the entire tour and the entire visit. Siamak Naghian had articulated so eloquently how I was trying to organize these thoughts. "If you look at the sustainability, long-term working environment, and the production that you saw, all those things are because of the society where we live and there are things that people really appreciate. They're living in a community where their work is appreciated, there is equality, and basic issues like security in the society. So,