Bose Is Buying Skullcandy (wired.com) 41
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Longtime audio giant Bose announced on Wednesday that it's acquiring Skullcandy, the lifestyle brand known for its bass-heavy headphones. Skullcandy will remain a separate company within Bose's Premium Consumer Audio business and will still be based in Park City, Utah.
The acquisition isn't out of left field. Bose has lent its audio expertise to Skullcandy over the past year under its Sound by Bose licensing program. Skullcandy designs the headphones and then works with Bose on the audio front. The relationship began with the Skullcandy Method 360 ANC earbuds in 2025 and more recently, with the Crusher 1080 ANC headphones in July.
[...] This is hardly Bose's first audio acquisition (though it may be the most mainstream). Bose acquired McIntosh Group, owners of luxury audio brands McIntosh Laboratory and Sonus Faber, back in 2024. But Bose seems to be after Skullcandy's connection to its community. "What does the brand stand for? Does it have meaning for consumers? Is it relevant to a group of consumers that, frankly, we otherwise aren't reaching?" Bose CEO Lila Snyder tells WIRED. "If you think about McIntosh, Sonus Faber, and Skullcandy, they all fit into that realm. Skullcandy gives us access to a customer base that we think we're largely missing with the Bose brand."
That's why Bose has no plans to relocate Skullcandy from Park City, Utah, which Snyder says is the epicenter of board sports culture. "We want to make sure we're right at the heart of it, as they always have been," she says. Skullcandy products are also affordable, especially compared to other Bose products and Bose-owned brands, which lets Bose compete at both ends of the market.
The acquisition isn't out of left field. Bose has lent its audio expertise to Skullcandy over the past year under its Sound by Bose licensing program. Skullcandy designs the headphones and then works with Bose on the audio front. The relationship began with the Skullcandy Method 360 ANC earbuds in 2025 and more recently, with the Crusher 1080 ANC headphones in July.
[...] This is hardly Bose's first audio acquisition (though it may be the most mainstream). Bose acquired McIntosh Group, owners of luxury audio brands McIntosh Laboratory and Sonus Faber, back in 2024. But Bose seems to be after Skullcandy's connection to its community. "What does the brand stand for? Does it have meaning for consumers? Is it relevant to a group of consumers that, frankly, we otherwise aren't reaching?" Bose CEO Lila Snyder tells WIRED. "If you think about McIntosh, Sonus Faber, and Skullcandy, they all fit into that realm. Skullcandy gives us access to a customer base that we think we're largely missing with the Bose brand."
That's why Bose has no plans to relocate Skullcandy from Park City, Utah, which Snyder says is the epicenter of board sports culture. "We want to make sure we're right at the heart of it, as they always have been," she says. Skullcandy products are also affordable, especially compared to other Bose products and Bose-owned brands, which lets Bose compete at both ends of the market.
Bose (Score:4, Insightful)
Buy Other Stereo Equipment
Better Off Something Else
No highs no lows it must be bose
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Overpriced? Underperforming? Must be Bose.
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And skullcandy hasn't been anything to care about either.
Re:Bose (Score:4, Funny)
My thoughts exactly. Bose knows how to do "ear-catching", but I find listening to their stuff for any length of time gets really old really fast. Recently we had to rent a car, and it had a Bose sound system. The sound was impressive - in the same way that a freight train whizzing past with its horn blowing is impressive. I guess that's why I tend to dub the company "Blose" ...
I could not get that radio to not make my ears hurt, even after extensive fiddling with the controls. I finally settled on settings that were reminiscent of a cheap 70's transistor radio - that was the least objectionable sound I could wrest from the thing. So the Skullcandy acquisition fits - it's "showy" sound for people who let trends and advertising, rather than their ears, dictate how their music systems sound.
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Sennheiser Orpheus please
Re: Bose (Score:2)
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Today I'd say that you'd probably need to put up some $50k USD. Original price was $16k USD, but they are a collectors item. Their successor HE-1 are in the same price range.
I have listened to them and the worst thing is that they actually sound so good that they'd be worth the price. But I'm not a headphone user so if I had them they'd be a dust collector.
Re: Bose (Score:2)
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Re: Bose (Score:2)
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You can get headphones from Shure and Audio-Technica with better frequency response than anything from Bose.
Re: Bose (Score:2)
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Their noise cancelling is apparently good. The actual cancelling bit, not the overall sound. But it's also massively over-priced and there are better options, especially when it comes to comfort.
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Bose: Better sound via marketing!
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Buy Other Stereo Equipment
Better Off Something Else
No highs no lows it must be bose
Lets be honest, modern music is so terrible that quality reproduction is completely unnecessary.
The treble and middle are drowned out by repetitive bass (there are no highs and lows any more... just duf duf duf), little variation in timbre and pitch and in the rare event there is an instrument playing it'll be all of 4 chords (4... if you're lucky).
I guess now I know who I won't be buying from. (Score:1)
Bose is a Boomer lifestyle brand, not high end. (Score:5, Informative)
Bose survives on lifestyle marketing and nostalgia. They made decent small dorm and barracks systems when I bought 901s at the Ramstein audio photo club, but that era is ancient history.
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Bose survives on lifestyle marketing and nostalgia. They made decent small dorm and barracks systems when I bought 901s at the Ramstein audio photo club, but that era is ancient history.
Yes and no. They are definitely a lifestyle target company, but they do throw some significant technical capability into that. But it's a tradeoff, always has been. In terms of absolute audio quality they are pretty rubbish, but in terms of invisible audio that integrates into cafe, studio, living room, etc. they aren't actually that bad.
And their noise cancelling on headsets is best in class (it's a shame their sound quality doesn't match).
I wouldn't ever recommend their hifi systems though unless your wif
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Re:I guess now I know who I won't be buying from. (Score:5, Funny)
No, Bose is buying Skullcandy.
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They should call it skose.
Wired (Score:2)
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I bought these and did not like the noise canceling on these. Also I couldn't find a good fit with those wings. Returned them.
Re: Wired (Score:2)
Its not who owns, its who runs ... (Score:2)
If not so, then there is a genuine concern that the acquiring company is just selling
Proprietary tech has its price long after purchase (Score:3)
https://www.pcmag.com/news/bos... [pcmag.com]
"In addition, the SoundTouch app will no longer function after Feb. 18, 2026, though it will still be available for download until then in markets outside of Japan. Users' My Bose accounts will remain active.
As for why itâ(TM)s cutting support now, Bose says technology has evolved since the speakers first launched in 2013 and that itâ(TM)s âoeno longer able to sustain the development and support of the cloud infrastructure that powers this older generation of products.â
This likely isnâ(TM)t welcome news for audiophiles who have spent large sums of money on the SoundTouch rangeâ"particularly as units such as the SoundTouch 30 retailed for north of $1,000. One Reddit user claims heâ(TM)s now sitting on âoe$4,000 worth of bricks" following the move. Meanwhile, others called the ending of support "exploitative,â shared links to a petition calling on Bose to renew support for the SoundTouch range, and asked their fellow users to send emails to Bose's management team."
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There's an open source workaround that de-clouds SoundTouch devices https://st-reborn.de/ [st-reborn.de]
That one reddit user will be fine unless he was stupid enough to throw out his "bricks" (what a strange term to use for a device that still functions without the cloud crap).
buying competition. (Score:2)
Lifestyle brand known for bass-heavy headphone (Score:3)
Are we talking about Skullcandy, or Bose. When I think of bass-heavy headphones, I immediately think Bose.
Now I am considered kind of strange because I use studio headphones as my primary headphones. I just like the proper reproduction of sound. Most people find it jarring as they are used to processed sound. The Bose were almost twice as much at the time, and the sound was completely wrong. Way too bass heavy, which is very typical of most, if not all of the Bose products.
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They were talking about Skullcandy... Bose is typically known for "No highs, no lows, must be Bose." However they recently took that to heart and reworked their latest line to add more bass emphasis, unfortunately. I think their sound used to be more balanced but I still prefer my Sennheisers to anything from Bose.
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I have some ancient Sennheiser HD 420s, I had to replace the foams (and hacked some other Sennheiser foams for that) but they are otherwise still flawless. The cord is nigh-indestructible and super long. And they are also super comfortable, they weigh nothing. It's way smarter to get used Sennheisers than new Bose.
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I needed to pick up some cheap headphones on vacation a few years back. Went to Best Buy and decided to pay a little extra for what must be the better headphones, the Skullcandys. They were some of the worst headphones I've ever heard. Not "bass-heavy", just tinny, metallic sounding, and uneven throughout the range. Dollar store quality, for a premium price. Never again.
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I have no experience with their cans, only their buds, which I've been very happy with. Maybe they have been ruined since they started taking advice from Bose, as I haven't bought any in a while, but the last ones I did buy had a more-easily-untangleable flat rubbery cord and sounded really nice. They were clear for both music and calls, and were less than twenty bucks... maybe $14?
I'm not a "pay extra" kind of guy, though I do try not to buy the absolute most crap thing. I'm a "refurb" type.
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These were $1.25 headphones being sold for $70-$80. This was in 2019, not sure if that was before or after Bose.
Fuck (Score:2)
I've been buying Skullcandy earbuds because they are cheap and good. They might remain good...
I think they go perfectly together (Score:2)
...and it is genuinely an efficiency gain: now I can completely avoid 2 shit product families from only 1 vendor.
That's great!
Bose.... shit. (Score:2)