Demonstration Report: I attended the technology demonstration at ATCO's company headquarters today. They are currently sharing offices with Norris Communications Corp, which is across the street from Patriot Scientific Corp. Elwood Norris founded these 2 other companies and manages ATCO's research and development activities.
Mr. Norris spent about a half-hour explaining the principles behind his new sound reproduction technology, which he calls HSS, or "HyperSonic Sound". I'm not a physicist or engineer, but he made it pretty easy to understand. If you are unfamiliar with the technology, visit ATCO's home page at www.atcsd.com for a discussion of theory and practical application, as well as other background info on the company and on Norris himself. The important points about HSS are:
Harmless ultrasonic frequencies mixed in a region of space generate audible sound in that space, allowing discrete positioning of sound in "thin air"
Based on solid, well-known physics principles
Near-perfect frequency response with virtually no distortion
Not dependant on size, no enclosures needed
An efficient producer of sound requiring a fraction of the power needed for traditional amplifiers
Has a huge market with many potential applications
Norris explained that American Technology Corp. will license the technology similar to the way Dolby licenses its patented techniques. He said they have several patents pending on the key technology and just recently submitted another batch due to related discoveries in the amplifier circuitry. He is adamant that his patents are solid, and claims to have spent over a million dollars of his own money over the years on patent filings.
He also says that inquiries from industry giants have been pouring in since the Economist article came out, including all the U.S. auto manufacturers, a "four-letter" Japanese consumer electronics giant, speaker manufacturers, etc. Their plan is to visit some of these prospects with a prototype next week.
He told the group of 40 people or so that the demo we were about to hear was not going to occur under optimum conditions. He claims this is because his best quality transducers are currently being used at another company that is producing the prototype for them to take on the road next week. In the meantime, he was going to be showing us an inferior device which he had cobbled together, but one that would at least demonstrate the technique of producing sound out of thin air.
Norris scoffed at a posting on the Internet this morning from someone (probably Scott Levine on this forum) who had attended an earlier demo and who said he was very disappointed with the thin, mono sound and that he had doubts ATCO would be able to produce a workable product. I had read the post this morning also, so I was prepared to be disappointed.
Norris took us into one of his labs where he had a golf-ball sized transducer attached to various frequency generators and a cheesy AM/FM portable radio. He held up the transducer and pointed it at the audience, rotating it around the room. At first, I wasn't sure if the sound was coming from the device or from mid-air between the device and myself, so I was initially skeptical. Here's where I agree with the earlier post from Scott that the sound and effect were both disappointing. However, I could hear something unusual, so I stood up and got right next to Norris. He aimed it at the acoustic ceiling and now I could clearly tell there was no sound coming from the device in his hand, but that it was coming from the ceiling. It was pretty impressive. Yes, the sound was at low volume and very "tinny", but it was coming from thin air as Norris had promised.
I told Norris that I too found the sound quality to be pretty disappointing, and argued that this technology wouldn't have much value unless he could prove that it really could be a stereo, high-fidelity, high-volume experience. Norris claims he has already produced much better results and said there was no question that the technology could do what he claims. He also claims to have done it in stereo. So, essentially you have to take him at his word for now until this next prototype is finished. He did make a good point, which is that getting sound, any sound to be generated in thin air is 99% of the achievement. Refining it to be a higher quality listening experience is much easier. He used the example of the telephone and the phonograph player, which had horrible initial quality compared to later improved versions.
His enthusiasm was infectuous and I found him to be very entertaining. He answered all questions confidently and clearly, and had a positive answer for just about anything we could throw at him. Like many in the room I'm sure, at first I wondered if he was all showman and sales hype. (I couldn't help but note that his bio states he received a national Thespian award in 1956) But you cannot ignore his credentials as a successful inventor. According to his bio, he has "15 U.S. patents and more than 100 patents worldwide. His inventions include a transcutaneous Doppler, a product that evolved into today's Sonogram devices used by doctors...his innovate products have received Product of the Year awards from Popular Science...Business Week...as well as the prestigious Eddy Award from MacUser Magazine."
I think you have to agree that the market for this technology is incredibly large. According to company literature, the U.S. consumer high-fidelity audio market is in excess of $11 billion per year, with 1995 purchases of home and auto speakers totaling $600 million. If HyperSonic Sound can be produced at the level of quality Norris is assuring us that it can be, then you can understand his enthusiasm, because this truly would be a revolutionary achievement on the level of the telephone, or Compact Disc player. Besides, a real inventor has a lot more fun showing off his latest creation than trying to squeeze money out of a bunch of investors, and this was the ultimate impression Mr. Norris left me with.
I encourage you to call the company and get their information packet; there's a lot more in there that isn't on the company website, including the Form 10s for you financial analysts. I haven't digested all of the written material because I wanted to report my impressions of the demo ASAP. And yes, I bought stock in this company today. I have no idea what this company is worth, but I know what this technology could be worth. Either I'm participating in the beginning of a revolution in sound reproduction with incredible market potential, or I just said goodbye to a small portion of my portfolio.
D. Kuspa |
