ORANGE COMPANY PROFILE
time lately, but the British stuff is still our bread and butter.”
INSIDE THE OPC The June issue of MI Pro included a feature on Orange’s latest masterpiece, the OPC, an ingenious PC and guitar amp hybrid, which is set for a launch at the fast- approaching NAMM show in January. Since that sneak preview, the company’s team of techies has been fine-tuning and developing the product to the point where Waller can reveal that they are more or less ready to go with it. “When we introduced it as a pre-launch at Musikmesse, we were looking for a reaction and we were overwhelmed with the response, as we heard back from over 70 countries within a month,” comments Waller. “More recently, we’ve also formed a number of great partnerships. One of these has been with Intel, who liked the OPC so much they’re taking it to the Computer Electronics Show in Las Vegas as a way of launching their new chip.”
MARKET LOW DOWN As if the company weren’t busy enough with all the aforementioned projects, Waller has also revealed how further expansion into the bass market has been a recent priority. Considering how it used to
have just one bass valve amp product in its lineup, a proper shift towards powering the four-string market has made Orange a contender for being one of the first amp companies to become a proper crossover brand for bass and electric guitar gear. “We’re now looking at
introducing more products and creating a proper range,” he says. “We’ve got new bass endorsers,
catching the attention of these countries, which is why these artists are just as crucial abroad as those that we in the west would consider to be stars.
STICKING TO ITS ROOTS There is a lot to like about Orange, but perhaps one of the main qualities, other than the immense standard of the products and the iconic styling, is that despite its ambitions for world domination, the manufacturer has also made every effort possible to stick to its original, traditional characteristics as much as possible. “We’ve always stuck to our roots,”
continues Waller. “We could have decided to do an all-singing-all-dancing version of the Tiny Terror, for example, but we chose not to. That’s not what we’re about and that’s not the point of our products. We might have been out in China a lot of the
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we’re doing events like the Bass Guitar Show and we’ve got new lines coming out next year. “People are taking us more seriously in this field now and I think we’re taking market share here. You can’t just say ‘here are the bass products’, you have to put some effort in.”
What is perhaps most surprising about
Orange is that the recession simply doesn’t seem to have affected them and this is even more impressive when you consider that most of its products are far from bargain basement. Waller feels that this is due to customers seeing an Orange purchase as a proper investment, rather than a temporary amplifying solution. Aside from its impressive, 40-year
history, this manufacturer has been expanding and growing year-on-year for the last decade. With two Queen’s Awards under its belt and a, shall we say ‘cautiously aggressive’ approach to innovation, this pattern is unlikely to tail off any time soon. ORANGE: 020 8905 2828
miPRO DECEMBER 2010 31
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