Meridian Audio, Ltd.
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| Limited company | |
| Industry | Audio/Visual Consumer electronics equipment manufacturing and distribution |
| Founded | 1977 |
| Founder | Bob Stuart, Allen Boothroyd |
| Headquarters | Huntingdon, England |
| Products | High-end loudspeakers, home theatre equipment |
| Website | www.meridian-audio.com |
Meridian Audio is an English manufacturer of high-performance, high-fidelity audio and video components and systems founded in 1977 by Bob Stuart and Allen Boothroyd.
Based in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, Meridian Audio was founded by John Robert (Bob) Stuart and Allen Boothroyd in 1977. They continue to lead the company with Stuart heading all technological developments and Boothroyd leading the design team. Since the company’s inception, all Meridian products have been conceived, engineered and built in the UK.
The company was the first to introduce active loudspeakers (loudspeakers with power amplifiers inside the cabinet) designed for the domestic market, and was the first British company to manufacture a CD player in 1983. The Meridian MCD, launched in 1985, was the first audiophile CD player. In his review of the MCD, audio engineer and Stereophile founder J. Gordon Holt wrote, "For the first time, the sound of the best CDs (Telarcs, RealTimes and Sheffields) is truly liquid and transparent, with an effortlessness that I have not previously heard except from the better analog sources... To date, then, this is the best-sounding CD player I've encountered." Meridian also created the first digital surround-sound processor and the first DSP-based digital active loudspeakers.
The flagship DSP8000 active loudspeakers were released in the late 1990s as part of the company's new 800 series. Subsequent loudspeaker models (DSP7000, DSP5200) employed the styling that contributed to the success of the DSP8000.
2006 saw the retirement of both Sales & Marketing Director Colin Aldridge and Managing Director Douglas Watson, long-term employees of the company. Robert Haefling, previous MD of Faroudja, was brought in as acting Managing Director and given a mandate to find external investment for the brand. Despite Meridian's excellent reputation within the audiophile community, the company was only modestly profitable and many major investments (e.g. the move to the new premises previously occupied by the ill-fated Tag McLaren brand) were predominately funded by the Taylor family - Bob Stuart's family-in-law (who had originally founded the Boston Globe newspaper).
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