Rio Brand Closes Doors

Castar writes "In a press release today, D&M Holdings announced the end of the Rio brand. Rio had a troubled history, but were responsible for the first mass-market MP3 players as well as more recent popular players such as the Rio Karma. This closing follows the sale of Rio's IP to Sigmatel, maker of chipsets for many audio players, including the iPod Shuffle." From the release: "The company's decision to exit the Rio business followed a determination that the mass-market portable digital audio player market was not a strong enough strategic fit with the company's core and profitable premium consumer electronics brands to warrant additional investment in the category. The original goal of strategic advantage with wholly-owned and branded portable client devices was reconsidered in the context of the costs required to effectively scale and compete in this sector, where competition has grown intense. D&M Holdings will now focus all its resources on the core Premium AV business and advanced content server products."

Comments

One fan sorry to see them go

[bigwavejas]

The company's decision to exit the Rio business followed a determination that the mass-market portable digital audio player market was not a strong enough strategic fit with the company's core and profitable premium consumer electronics brands to warrant additional investment in the category.

Truth is, Apple simply crushed them with superior development, product and marketing. Apple also maintains a strong market share from the popularity of Podcasting (free advertising) and the Apple Music store. Not to mention a generation that embraces the Ipod and its culture, who can blame Rio for jumping ship?

What they did offer was a nice alternative. I owned a Rio mp3 player and functionally it worked just fine, no qualms. In fact, I enjoyed having a unique player, rather than the trendy Ipod. The problem was Rio just didn't offer any compelling "stand-out" features and the pricing was on-par with Apple's Ipod selection (which gave buyers very little reason to migrate to a Rio player).

Re:One fan sorry to see them go

[PCM2]

The problem was Rio just didn't offer any compelling "stand-out" features and the pricing was on-par with Apple's Ipod selection

I think you've nailed it right there. We old geezers in the audience can remember the advent of another personal audio device, the Walkman. "Walkman" was a Sony brand name. For a while, most of the portable tape players sold were Sonys. But let's face it -- they were just tape players. Pretty soon people started using the word "Walkman" as a generic term to mean any kind of portable cassette player. A lot of other manufacturers were already producing cassette mechanisms and sticking them into a smaller form factor wasn't really rocket science.

What's more, there just wasn't all that many ways a manufacturer could distinguish itself. It was hard to compete on long battery life when every device was expected to use AAs and you had those pesky DC motors to run. Sony got another run at it with "Mega Bass" but even that feature wasn't innovative enough for Sony to corner the market. Their "Sports" models were popular for a while, with the shiny yellow impact-proof plastics. Truthfully Sony probably remained a leader, if not the leader, throughout the whole Walkman phenomenon. But at the end of the day, if you were going to go out and buy a portable tape player today you probably wouldn't care if it was made by Sony or not, and you'd still probably call it a Walkman.

But so now you have the MP3 player market and things aren't so simple. There are more formats to consider, more gizmos you can add on to take advantage of those little CPUs and big hard drives. I personally own an iRiver player, but I have to admit that Apple's iPod UI is way superior. Apple is pretty much kicking ass in this market, and it's doing it because it came up with a solid, innovative product to begin with and there hasn't been a single other feature anyone's come up with yet that can't be had from a stock iPod or a few add-on accessories.

It's possible that other manufacturers could put together product lines that have most of the features and appeal of the iPod and force the prices in the market ever downward. At that point, maybe the term "iPod" would effectively become generic, as well. But right now Apple has a helluva lead and I haven't seen anything that I'd expect to give the iPod a serious run for its money.

(Oh, the reasons I went with the iRiver were OGG support and the ability to record to either WAV or MP3, including optical line-in. But iRiver has disappointed me with some of its choices, particularly in the things it promised to deliver with firmware updates but never did, choosing instead to keep cooking up new product lines to try to catch up with Apple.)

Re:One fan sorry to see them go

[Castar]

The problem was Rio just didn't offer any compelling "stand-out" features and the pricing was on-par with Apple's Ipod selection (which gave buyers very little reason to migrate to a Rio player).

The real problem is that they didn't advertise their compelling features. Marketing was Rio's gigantic failure. They had Ogg playback, Gapless (which no one has managed to even duplicate!), an ID3 database-based storage system, really long battery life, better EQ and sound quality, and a smaller form factor. (This is all on the Karma, BTW)

Of course, they didn't TELL anyone about those features, so is it any wonder they failed?

Re:One fan sorry to see them go

[martinX]

No-one gives a shit about Ogg playback except for people here.

Since the /.ers knew the rio had Ogg playback and were deeply grateful, they all bought one, right? They didn't? They bought an iPod?? Well, looks like no-one at all gives a shit about Ogg.

As for the other features, well they were lost in a sea of also-rans. Sorry.

Proof that first to market doesn't equal success

[Infonaut]

One of the mantras I heard ad nauseum during the Dot Com era was that if you can get there first, you'll get mindshare, which will lead to marketshare, which will lead to market dominance. First-movers have been shot down enough times now that everyone should recognize that being first in a market is not enough, and it can actually be a hindrance.

Your competitors get to watch what you're doing, learn from your mistakes, then jump in at the right time. I'm not saying that being first in a market is never a good strategy, but it's long past the time for the business development people out there to wake up and recognize that if you have a first to market strategy, you'd better have an excellent plan for capitalizing on the initial advantage.

Strategic Failure

[Doc Ruby]

"not a strong enough strategic fit" == "we couldn't compete anymore"

A press release means never having a reporter respond to your "I'm resigning for personal reasons, to spend more time with my family" with "Senator, what about the dead body they found in your bathroom?". Not that today's reporters ask Senators anything more than "where do I get the press release?".

Marketing or lack of it

[Jjeff1]

I own an Empeg. It's now several years old, but at the time, was the best tech out there for putting MP3s into a car. In fact it's still nothing to shake a stick at.

But the empeg folks sold their outfit to rio and started working there. That was pretty much the end of the empeg. It was never really marketed by Rio, and the price never came down much. Rio pretty much let it die. It should have been a really popular product.

The end of Ogg support?

[samesong]

The sole reason I bought the Rio Karma was its ability to play OGG files; the open source alternative to Mp3 (and is arguabley a better codec than Mp3). When my Karma dies, what do I do with my 15 gigs of Oggs?

Re:firsdtsd

[Anonymous Coward]

Sad to witness a good, innovative brand going down because another company uses juvenile mass-marketing to push its underpowered, overpriced rip-off through.

Amazing how stupid the American people is.

Re:AKA

[nate nice]

Everything looks ugly compared to the iPod. Apple flat out owns this market and the future looks great...what it can lead to. This is why if you bought Apple stock 3 or 4 years ago for $13.00 it's gone up past $75.00, split and is around $45.00 right now and you're rich.

Re:I wonder...

[Bobartig]

I'd bet good money Rio and Apple are using the same HDD's for their players. If the drives are crapping out, its 99% drive MFR, or user's fault.

Some people are astounded by the rate at which HDD based MP3 players crap out, but I'm not. When has it ever been the case that we went running, camping, road tripping with any kind of HDD strapped to our waist, and had the HDD accessed every couple minutes the entire time? They're just not up to the task yet. Either their failing a bunch, or their being broken a bunch. Whichever it is, they're just not ready for the way we live.

Re:AKA

[vagrancy]

....of course we got pw3nd by the iPod. Style, grace, and a helluva lot of features. Expensive, yes. Awesome, yes. Worth it? You bet your sweet (or unsweet) music collection.

A little secret

[Overly Critical Guy]

People don't care about Ogg Vorbis or FLAC. They just don't. In fact the only time I see the word "Ogg" even mentioned is on Slashdot. Ogg and FLAC playback, therefore, just aren't killer features in a player. Everybody uses MP3 (and AAC).

iPod won because it was designed extremely simply with little fluff. While other tech devices have pointless buttons, seams, and lines all over them with long names like "SONY DIGITAL XD450c," iPod was always as simple as a CD player and looked nice. The clickwheel makes it fun to use. I don't know, it just seems really obvious to me why the iPod won and competitors failed. When I go to the local store and see the iPods next to all the bizarre-looking WMA competitors that scream "tech device designed by engineers!" instead of just "music player," there really is no comparison.

As a sidenote, it's amusing how my Wal-mart puts the iPods at the bottom on the floor shelf and hangs all the crappy alternatives above it where people can reach. They have a WMA-based music service to sell, after all.

Re:A little secret

[Oliver Defacszio]

This is a fantastic post, and it's the difference between Apple and everyone else. Apple will never, ever make the absolute best of anything, but the mix of technical competence and style is what has more than tripled Apple's stock since the introduction of the iPod.

The overdesigned problem is everywhere. I have a 2004 model Clarion CD player in my car. It works well and sounds great, but it has a whirling animated chaser on the display that doesn't appear to do anything but scream "I am technologically impressive!" It looks like a "CD is playing" icon, but continues to spin as long as a CD is physically loaded, despite the current function of the player. Since most reasonable people have a CD loaded at virtually all times, even when listening to the radio or an auxiliary input, the chaser spins relentlessly, long into the night.

A big deal? No. Gimmicky and pointless? Yes. That LCD space could have been used to allow longer song titles without scrolling or whatever, but, instead, the geek-factor again overwhelmed practicality. If Apple designed automotive products, I guarantee this wouldn't be the case.

Nobody says that visual appeal has to equal brutal simplicity, but I don't need to be reminded that I am living in THE 21ST CENTURY! every time I pick up a technological device.

If they sold their IP...

[J. T. MacLeod]

If they sold their IP to the same company that produces the tech Apple is using, maybe Ogg playback and gapless playback will make it to the iPod?

Here's hoping...

Re:One down...

[miscz]

OMG, I can't stand all those iPod lovers. It's just another mp3 player that doesn't have anything to offer except pretty looks. Where's OGG, FLAC support? Where's possibility to change battery? The truth is that Karma and iRiver are much better products but they fail at being well advertised :\

Re:Disposable computing.

[Kphrak]

The average computer uses as much as two circus tents worth of coal to run on any given day.

Umm, any hard data (from an impartial site, please) for this? I'm guessing you pulled this out of your ass.

Reason why I don't believe it is that my building has thousands of computers, usually running all the time. One circus tent, according to De Boers (warning: large PDF), is 44x44x12 meters, or somewhat less than 23,232 cubic meters Your quote means that every day a computer uses about 46,464 cubic meters of coal every day.

To keep things in perspective, the United States produced about 2936986.3 tons of coal per day in 2003. Let's say that coal is about 52 pounds per cubic foot on average. That means we produced an average of 112,961,000 cubic feet of coal, or 3,196,796.29 cubic meters, per day. (2936986 * 2000 / 360 /52 * .0283), tons/year->lbs/year->lbs/day->ft^3/day->m^3/day)

If my math is correct (and I did do this in kind of a hurry, so be kind), your statement would mean that only 68 computers (3196796.29 / 46464) running all year long would exhaust the yearly coal production of the United States.

You've got to be kidding me.. or trolling.. badly

[xtal]

If oil prices get to the point where computer equipment gets prohibitive - here's a news flash for you - you're not going to be worrying about a $1500 iPod, you're going to be worrying about not starving to death, freezing, or being killed by a roving mob.

People amaze me. Disposable computing, indeed.

Go recycle some paper and compost some peels. That'll help. Not.

Re:Disposable computing.

[coldmist]

If only we could have this type of commentary on the BS politicians feed the press, that ripped apart a lot of their stupid arguments, just as you did this wild claim.

Here, here!

Re:In other words...

[larry bagina]

And SlashPod played a BIG role in promoting the iPod over ALL else.

Dream on. Every article about the iPod is full of posters who claim they won't buy one until it supports ogg and iTMS sells non-DRM, uncompressed music for $.25 (or less) a track.