HARMAN Luxury Audio Group has introduced new branding for ARCAM while the company also launched the new ARCAM Radia Series, a new family of luxury audio products.
The branding and launch of the Radia Series were revealed the branding to customers and media at an event this week at the Vinyl Factory in London. According to HARMAN, the branding, designed to lead its product development and industrial design into the future, centered around three key tenets: amazing sound, British heritage and luxury within reach.
ARCAM, a Cambridge, U.K.-based firm brand, will continue developing high-end audio equipment for audiophiles and music creators, but the new industrial-themed design aesthetic was created to also appeal to a new and younger segment of customers with a more affordable, sleek and attractive design without compromising on audio quality, the company says.
According to Tim Giblin, director of global marketing for HARMAN Portfolio Brands, the company identified a third core customer: younger audio enthusiasts who want to enhance their sound systems with affordable, high-end systems. The company calls this “luxury within reach.”
“With an aspirational call to ‘Be the Centre of the Music’ we are having our customers identify with a brand that is forward thinking not only in styling, but in the sound innovation that has made ARCAM a top brand in luxury audio for nearly fifty years,” Giblin says.
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Simultaneous to the rebranding, the company also announced the ARCAM Radia Series of audio products, which include the ARCAM A5, A15 and A25 integrated amplifiers; the ARCAM CD5 CD player; and the ARCAM ST5 high-resolution streamer.
These are the first products designed under the brand’s new industrial design and marketing refresh. They include Class AB and G integrated amplifiers and a matching streamer and CD player.
According to HARMAN, the Radia products offer a subtle symmetrical design that compliments their aluminum shells. They include a seamless front fascia, redesigned knobs, and gentle lighting effects. The products showcase a smooth, matte black surface cut through with the new signature Radia yellow highlights.
On the top, ventilation cutouts are hidden within a pattern of dynamic lines. The rear sports a connector cowl, designed to look like ornate rear diffusers found in performance cars, that effectively hides unsightly connector housings from view. The redesigned knobs are curved, finished in satin black, and textured to mask fingerprints.
ARCAM equips the new Radia amplifiers with Bluetooth aptX Adaptive receivers, internal antennas, digital inputs, and ARCAM’s signature MM phono stage. The 2x50W A5 and 2x100W A15 Class AB amplifiers include new digital circuitry based on the ESS ES9018 DAC. The 2x100W A25 steps up to a Class G amplifier and the ESS ES9280AQ DAC, in addition to USB-C inputs, LED illuminated highlights, and a seamless OLED display on the front panel.
Sporting an internal Wi-Fi antenna, the ST5 music streamer supports many music services, including Amazon Music Unlimited, Qobuz, Internet radio, podcasts, Tidal Connect, and Spotify Connect. In addition, the streamer offers support for MQA, Google Chromecast, Apple Airplay2, and Roon. The CD5 CD player offers CD, CD-R, and CD-RW playback; playback from USB mass storage; and support for FLAC, WAV, and MP3 formats. Both the ST5 and CD5 feature an ESS ES9018 DAC and boast 24-bit/192-kHz resolution.
Jim Garrett, senior director of product strategy and planning at HARMAN, says the company wanted to include a number of technical innovations in the Radia Series, and eventually created what the company thinks is “one of the best-sounding amplifiers (HARMAN) has ever created.”
“In addition to a sleek new design that will define ARCAM’s image for years to come, with the Radia family, we’ve renewed our focus on intimate performance and embraced the very latest audio technologies,” Garrett says. “For today’s audio enthusiasts, especially younger ones looking to get into a luxury audio system at a reasonable cost, the resulting solutions surpass not only our past offerings, but any product that’s come before.”
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