tc13 wrote: ↑08 Sep 2019
Ernst, Marcus Zetterqvist and Pelle Jubel still own more then 30% of the company ( Ernst 15.9% PeJu holding 9.6% and MZ holding 6,3%) verdane owns 68.2%
Ernst is also a chairman of the board so I really wouldn’t call that gone...
Well sure, I have some shares in a few publicly listed companies, it doesn't mean I call the shots. I get as many votes in corporate elections as my shares allow (in my cases a fraction of a percent of those companies
![Laughing :lol:](./images/smilies/icon_lol.gif)
). If, as you say, the private equity investor holds 68% then they have controlling interest in the company's future interests, and the CEO has been installed to make that realization. And as far as the position of Chairman is concerned, it is not an operational role, and does not necessarily carry any executive powers whatsoever (it's a 'token' position' in many cases like this)
Why does anyone care so much about about the company structure anyway ? The business is being traded to make a healthy profit, and what that means for us is that development will increase, which is a good thing. To those that say this is 'the beginning of the end' is really off the mark. What we will see is more - more innovations, more product releases, more everything. While that may not be on everyone's wishlists, it surely bodes well for the continued development of the Reason platform. It's why we have seen repackaged assets sold as new products (Reason Bass, Reason Drums, Reason Piano etc which are all ReFills from old), because it's an easy win. It will also mean that all the near-completed developments they have been sitting on for a long time will be released to the market.
The decisions made in Stockholm over the coming 12 months make not one bit of difference as far as my creative output is concerned. But to speculate, I imagine that after the new revenue stream from 'other DAW' customers levels out, we will see a free VST wrapper, or maybe even a direct RE to VST porting, allowing anyone to buy Rack Extensions, which will create incentives for third party developers to sell to a whole new market.
It may not mean that we, as existing users, get the benefits of their growth strategy, but it does mean that Reason will be around for a long time to come. Whomever the owners will be in the coming year or two does not matter. My money's on Yamaha, the $300 billion Japanese megacompany, whom already have interests in music-related brands. Or for all we know, with the growth of billionaire businessmen in China, we might be seeing a sell off of Reason to a 'new rich' guy in Shanghai who wants to have a cool brand in his portfolio. It's not often that a DAW becomes available for sale.
On a side note, and a fun fact for the day -many people don't realize that Yamaha started as a music company, not a motorcycle brand. This is why their logo is made up of three tuning forks.