Gaetan Byk, owner and CEO of Amadeus
France - Gaetan Byk is now the principal and majority shareholder in charge of Amadeus, the Paris-based manufacturer of high-end audio equipment. Michel Deluc, who co-founded the original Amadeus brand with Bernard Byk 30 years ago, has created many of the company’s speaker designs and remains at Amadeus to lead specific design and manufacturing projects.
“For many years, my mission has been to find a space for Amadeus, a unique place where technological innovations with arts and crafts, combine and complement each other,” states Gaetan Byk. “I think we need to go where our main competitors cannot, do not know how to, or do not want to go. Designing tailor-made solutions, responding to existing architectural, acoustic, and technical constraints have been our areas of expression for a long time. Over the past few years, some rather out-of-the-norm products were born this way."
Over the past 10 years, Gaetan Byk has guided the company and its products to new heights. Many products were created, including the hi-fi Philharmonia reference monitor, designed with world-renowned architect Jean Nouvel for the Philharmonie de Paris concert hall recording studios; the stone-clad speakers made for the Panthéon; the unique speakers designed for Krug Champagne House made of corten steel - cut and then laser welded - and today, the nearly 40m-long bespoke sound ramp designed for the Festival d’Avignon, the largest performing arts theatre festival in the world.
Collaborating with IRCAM and several other key French institutions, Amadeus also figures among the pioneers of spatial sound for the live field.
Gaetan Byk explains the combination of business and creative design the company offers, “Our approach is rather transversal and our technical knowledge within the company is very complementary. We mainly work in the electro-acoustic industry, namely the production of loudspeakers for live entertainment applications and high-end hi-fi - through the Philharmonia brand.
“We also deal with, on purely acoustic issues, the world of the recording studio, for many famous artists, producers, arrangers, and commercial studios. These departments have been, and continue to be, managed by Michel Deluc.”
“Finally, the development of the Holophonix brand, based around spatial and immersive sound, led us to new areas and markets,” states Gaetan Byk. “I think there will always be a place for innovative and unique products, as well as creative solutions that are designed, developed, and manufactured-on-demand.”
Gaetan Byk concludes: “My goal is to remain, as far as possible, the majority shareholder of the Amadeus company structure to preserve our DNA and above all not enter into a logic of unbridled growth. My wish is to do better, not more.”

Latest Issue. . .