Hi, KN7000 -

Thanks you for your following quote.

"Hi Kn7. Just a little back-up for you, re the kn7000. I consider the kn7000 to be the best sounding, user friendliest, best all in styles, without having to lay-out for 11 expansion boards like the Roland G-70 at considerable Extra cost to the buyer. The kn7000 had it all, and it proved itself to beat allcomers. The company let it down by stopping all productions of musical instruments. Hence the only reason I sold my KN7000 was because of the Technics Company. I am extremely sorry I did sell. I feel like I've lost a part of myself. kn7000"

Well said. I'm sorry for your loss of a great instrument. Hopefully, you will find another.

Perhaps the people at Panasonic decided that they had reached a plateau in keyboard technology and there was no further technology needed that hadn't already been done. Let's face it guys, you have all these sounds that can create any type music on the face of the earth, what more do you want!!! Perhaps I will turn in my KN7000 when it can cook for me, clean house and do my shopping. Until then, I will compose; come up with fabulous arrangements in COMPOSER and on the SEQUENCER while all the one-finger players play on the over emphasized Tyros 2. Hopefully, all the owners won't get a hernia lifting the external speakers that sit on the keyboard, like "two warts on a witch's chin" and woofer to kick in to that will cause ingrown toenails. Let them suffer in their own "gotta have the latest" technology frenzy.

Perhaps the people at Panasonic decided that they had reached a plateau in keyboard technology and there was no further technology needed that hadn't already been done.

If Panasonic had a thriving keyboard bussiness
They surely wouldn't as you suggest close it simply because " there was no further technology needed" I understand they only closed the music division of their bussiness, which means they continue to improve and invest in all other aspects of their products.

In reality if a bussiness closes it's more than likely because it's not making any money,
simple as that!

Because Yamaha, Roland, Korg etc are still out there making keyboards, it must mean that there instruments were more appealing to the majority of music lovers in general. Maybe other factors would also play a part like sales aftercare, marketing skills, etc but the bottom line has to be not enough people were buying Technics keyboards. Which is a great shame as I agree with you the Kn7000 is brilliant.

I hoped they'd go back into production by now, but there you are, we can but live in hope.

All the best

Peter

Technics was just the marketing brand of the Matsushita Electric company of Japan, and was originally used to define the companies high quality audio equipment, (The more basic going under the Panasonic name) the first musical instruments to use this name were the U series of Organs which were one of the most user friendly instruments of the time, (Previous organs went under the Panasonic name) this was in the early eighties, and if the sales had not been increased by this remarketing of the Musical instrument range, they were going to pull the plug on production. Fortunately it worked and production continued, eventually moving on to include Pianos and Single keyboards.
Like all companies Matsushita constantly review the markets for there products, and in the early part of this century they found that the musical instrument division produced just 1% of turnover, which they considered not worth continuing with, and so the plug was pulled.
The main reason for the instruments user friendliness was because all there musical instruments were designed as a consumer product (To them the Musical instruments were no different to a TV, Hi-Fi or Washing machine) not a stage instrument, unlike Yamaha, Roland, Korg etc, who watered down there stage instruments (Synths etc) so that the General Public could use and understand them. (This changed over the years as the market increased, and so these companies set up consumer divisions)

Bill

The Electronic Music Instrument Division of Matsushita, parent of Panasonic and Technics was successful and profitable when the decision was made. Technics brand (eg for hi-fi too) was to disappear as a marketing exercise leaving Panasonic as the consumer brand name. Consumer keyboards overall are a declining market year on year in total and they just made the calculation that paying expensive and artistically capable engineers to work on other areas of electronics was more profitable than the labour and talent intensive job of producing consumer music instruments.

Very good points made by all.

There is one thing that must be mentioned that has played a huge part in lack of Technics keyboard sales. Through the years you have not been able to buy them in any professional music store. They were sold ONLY in stores that carried pianos and organs and it had to be a dealer that sold Technics organs and pianos. They were basically designed for home use and not for the musician that was a professional. Yamaha, Korg, Roland keyboards can be purchased anywhere. I remember when I was trying to buy a KN6000 years ago when it came out, I found it difficult to find one on line. It was known that Technics wouldn't allow their keyboards to be sold on the Net. As it was, I contacted a site that discounted musical instruments but didn't carry Technics. The owner had a friend that was a Technics dealer and put me in touch with him and I made the contact that way. In other words, it was through a contact that I was able to buy the keyboard at a discount because this Technics dealer was a piano dealer and had no website. I have always found it amazing that they never pushed their keyboards to the public as could easily be found by the aforementioned keyboards. Quite frankly, I was always pleased that it wasn't easy to find a Technics keyboard. Playing in public, I certainly didn't want the guy down the street to be playing on a board like mine. With Yamaha, Korg, Roland... they can be purchased and discounted in any Music gear shop, including Radio Shack and electronic discount businesses that sell cameras, etc.

We all should feel VERY SPECIAL on this forum for we have had the good fortune to play and own a Technics board. I'm sure it would come to know surprise of professional musicians not being fully aware of the capabilities of our keyboards. They being directed to the other brands in music shops catering to the "professional."

This thread has been a real eye opener, for me at least. Never really bothered with why we can no longer buy Technics keyboards, the fact is we can't and I just thought "well that's that".

I've often wondered why they did not try to sell the keyboard side of things, the bussiness was successful and making a profit (be it all possibly only a small profit) surely it could still have been of some value to someone? Maybe they did try and sell, but there was no one interested?

Great shame things didn't work out anyway.

Very interesting

All the best

Peter

in reality it probably cost them more to close it down than to keep it going with compensating contracts etc, but consumer music instruments was just an absolutely insignificant part of the total Matsushita empire - turnover must have been tiny compared to just the battery division for example - and there is more money to be made in DVD, TV, Plasma etc etc.

As for market ask yourself where is the Genesys replacement? where is the SD1 replacement? What was so special about the G70? where are the really groundbreaking technological breakthroughs from psr9000 to tyros to tyros 2? All manufacturers are being meagre with their R&D compared to the past in this area.

I'm sure I read in the Zone when the closure announcement was first made, that the reason for this was that the founder of the Company was passionately interested in musical instruments and that he was more or less solely responsible for giving us the Technics organs and keyboards. When he died, his successor(s) who had no interest in music decided to close down this section of the empire. I'm also sure that Technics Player provided this info but I may be wrong in this respect.

One of the things I always looked forward to in acquiring a new keyboard was a supply of new styles.. I can't produce them myself - certainly not to the exceedingly high standard set by Technics. Now I know that pretty well the whole range of styles from previous instruments was available from the Technics site, but the bulk of these have no interest for me. I'm only interested in swing/jazz/latin. I've been waiting in vain, so far, for someone to produce new styles in this genre but looks so far as if I'll just go on waiting - in vain.

Happy music making to all.

Peter

no I did not, actually I disbelieved it in my reply, it was just an excuse put around by dealers. The demise of Technics brand name goes beyond just the Music Instrument division.

Hello Peter
You can purchase a program called Styleworks 2000 for your computer that will convert styles from other manufactures to the Technics format, (So there are plenty of the styles you require out there) you will however still have to change some of the sounds in the style to suit your particular keyboard. (Just like you have to modify the sounds when you import styles from older models of the same manufactures range.

Bill