By: Nick Gambino
Sonos is planning a two-day event in New York later this month where they are expected to announce a new line of quality speakers or audio products or…something.
The most recent hardware release from Sonos was their collaboration with IKEA. The crossover event featured a Sonos-powered lamp speaker and a bookshelf speaker that was intended to blend into your home decor. These items were surprisingly well-received. I guess it’s one of those things that might seem hokey on paper but turns out to be a sleeper hit.
There’s no information on exactly what the company is going to discuss at the event, but all signs point to a new product announcement. There’s not much else they could put on the agenda. They’re a speaker company. That’s what they do. A two-day event would only sustain itself if they’re talking about new products.
The speaker company spent much of the year racking up partnerships and adding support for things like Google Assistant to their speakers, so there’s a possibility they could be announcing more of the same. Though, if we’re talking product announcement, there are a few guesses as to what we’ll see.
They discontinued the Play:3 last year, which removed the middle-ground speaker between the Sonos One and Play:5. Perhaps, they will introduce a new Sonos:3 or its equivalent for a middle-of-the-road experience.
There are other avenues available for them to expand into. They don’t have much in the way of portability in their line-up. A robust speaker that allows you to move it outside or take it with you to the beach would probably be a popular item.
Speaking of portability, maybe we’ll finally see Sonos get into the headphones game. They’ve obviously done very well for themselves with their line of inter-connected speakers and the quality sound they produce, but headphones are just as popular a listening medium as speakers, if not more so.
A Statista survey conducted in 2017 states that 31% of people in the U.S. use headphones on a daily basis and only 18% say they never use them. Sonos could easily double their customer base by offering headphones that mirror the quality of their speakers.
All of this is speculation, but the press-only event is just a couple of weeks away, so we’ll know soon enough.
