When I first meet the Audio Fusion guys I was Fi with off-the-shelf hardware was possible. I
impressed with what they had set out to do. plunked down a few bucks for a booth to do a
Their goal was to let the on-stage musician demo of the technology at SXSW in 2015. The
hear and control their real-time monitor mix on user interface was rough but the response I got
their smart phones. Wow! I told them I have a from musicians and other gear manufacturers
rule of thumb. If you can solve a problem for a was undeniable. I was truly inspired and
church then you have a good product. This is encouraged to go for it. I soon learned why no
a prime example of that axiom in process. Meet one else had done this before. It turns out that
Kevin Slick CEO/CTO of Audio Fusion Systems [Kevin] I was a software engineer working on delivering real-time audio over Wi-Fi is really
Inc. networked products at Dell. In my spare time, I hard. I may have been a little early, but when
started using a Windows laptop and an Android 802.11AC came out it really put everything in
[WM] Hello Kevin, greet to have you with us. phone to put together a proof of concept for reach. I filed several patents and hired some
In a single word tell us what Audiofusion is? what later became Audiofusion™. I did enough great contractors in Austin to help me build out
back-of-the-envelope math to convince myself the UX/UI. By this time the first mixers had come
that, yes, delivering real-time audio over Wi- out that you could remote control from an iPad.
[Kevin Slick] Software.
[WM] How did you first come up with the idea
of Audiofusion™?
[Kevin] After years as a semi-professional
musician, I was volunteering as a monitor
engineer at my church to help them get what
they needed on stage each Sunday. Like a
lot of churches in the mid-2000’s, we were
running a mixture of wedges and wireless
IEMs. It was a challenge to keep the stage
noise under control and give the musicians
enough of what they needed to be successful.
Then the first personal monitor mixers came
out. These digitally networked boxes were a
game changer for a lot of churches but the
musicians were left to do their own mixes and
the monitor engineer couldn’t help them during
performances. The only way to hear what the
musician was hearing was to walk on stage and
physically plug headphones into their mixer. So,
the musicians were completely on their own if
anything changed or if something went wrong
during the performance. In 2007, when the
iPhone came out, I assumed that the music
gear companies would begin using the Wi-Fi
capabilities and incredible computing power of
smartphones to begin delivering real-time audio
for monitoring. I kept expecting someone to do
it, but no one did. Finally, in 2013, I decided to
do it myself.
[WM] What took place in those early years?
May 2020
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