John Eeles has joined Chameleon Audio Ltd of Cinderford, Gloucestershire, in a market development role to promote sales of the full Chameleon product lineup, and especially the new ultra compact, lightweight D777 pro audio amplifier. His experience covers all aspects of live and studio sound facilities. He started in the music business as a pro musician, moving into sound production to support many leading artists. He is still involved, through his own company Spadger, in all aspects of production for music festivals from the Shetlands to Jersey.

Commercial amplifier manufacturer Inter-M and its UK distributor, CIE Audio, are sponsoring a charity bid by Sandra Lee to trek across Alaska. The seven-day trek aims to raise money for SENSE - the national deafblind charity. CIE's Chris Edwards said: "The aim of Sandra's challenge is to benefit some of the UK's 23,000 deafblind people and their families and carers.

JBL Professional/Harman Professional's projects group has appointed Rod Falconer as marketing manager, with responsibility for developing communication between the JBL/Harman projects group and end-users. Prior to this appointment, Falconer worked for AMX Corporation in Dallas, and before that for Lone Wolf Corporation in Seattle. At the same time, the company has announced the appointment of Brad Ricks as systems integration specialist. In this role, Ricks will provide large project coordination and design assistance for systems contractors.

Tele Denmark Satellite & Broadcast (owned by Ameritec) has purchased 30 ADDA 2402 audio converters from Digital Audio Denmark. The Digital Audio Denmark ADDA 2402, 24-bit 96kHz A/D, D/A, D/D converter, has been selected by Tele Denmark in a project for getting the second national Danish TV channel DR2 distributed via the Terrestrial TV network. A total of 30 ADDA 2402s are used on different transmitter sites to convert the digital audio signal from the satellite receiver, and for feeding the analogue audio signal to the UHF transmitter system.

As part of its family of IR transmitters for conference and associated communications applications, Auditel has introduced a new range of compact 4- and 8-channel models. Aimed at situations requiring simultaneous interpretation facilities, the new models - the TVR-4X and TVR-8X - can be rack-mounted or free-standing as required. Features include a test emitter diode enabling the operator to test or monitor language transmissions during simultaneous interpretation broadcasts, tape recorder output, headphone monitoring and individual channel switches.

One of the largest pro audio sales confirmed at the recent Frankfurt Musikmesse was a major equipment upgrade from Neumann & Mueller, who will distribute their newly-acquired BSS Audio stock throughout their 11 rental depots in major German cities. The sale was confirmed by Mex Exner, from BSS Audio's exclusive German distributors Audio-Vertrieb Peter Strueven GmbH, shortly after writing out an order headed by 12 of the classic FCS-960 2 x 30-band graphic equalisers. Also included in the purchase were six FCS-920 Varicurve slaves, five TCS-804 2-in/4-out digital delay lines, six DPR-402 two-channel compressor/limiters/de-essers, four DPR-404 four-channel compressor limiters and seven DPR-504 four-channel noise gates.

The new AW4416 professional audio workstation from Yamaha is a complete stand-alone, 44-channel, 16-track, 24-bit recording studio with 12GB internal hard disk facilities (Expandable to 64GB). It incorporates many of the key features from some of Yamaha's most recent 'dedicated' products such as the 02R digital mixer, over 100,000 of which have been sold worldwide. The AW4416 will be available from July.

Tim Adams is to take on the role of Editor of Installation Europe following Mike Lethby's departure at the end of April. Adams, who for the last few years has been working alongside Jerry Gilbert at JGP public relations, will take up his new position at the end of May.

Simon Priestley has joined Allen & Heath as marketing executive in charge of the company's PR activities. With a wealth of experience in marketing & PR, which began in the early nineties at Link House Advertising Periodicals in Poole, Dorset, Priestley enriched his skills by writing for several of the titles in the Link House portfolio. A move to the National Motor Museum Trust, Beaulieu followed, where he successfully managed the marketing of the Trust's collection of 750,000 photographs and the world's largest Motoring reference library. Simon Priestley is pictured (right) with Andy Rigby-Jones at the recent Frankfurt Musik Messe.

CIE Audio has been appointed UK distributor for Communications Technology, the company set up by Tony Walker to manufacture a range of desk, paging and gooseneck microphones and accessories. "This range of microphones adds another string to the CIE bow, said Jon Doar, CIE Audio divisional manager. "Communications Technology's series of single, multi-zoned and pre-amplified desk mics perfectly complements our existing commercial lines from Inter-M, Atlas Soundolier and IC Audio."

Neil Mooring, one of the directors of John Hornby Skewes, died suddenly at his home on Sunday 30th April at the age of just 48. He was educated at Leeds Grammar School and joined John Hornby Skewes in 1970 at the age of 19. He worked in the sales office and was promoted to sales office manager before accepting a position as an area sales manager. He was promoted to purchasing manager in 1979 and joined the company Board of Directors. For many years he served on the Statistics Committee of the Music Industries Association. He leaves a wife Alison and two teenage children - Nicholas and Rebecca.

TSC Music Systems has won an Investors in People Award. The Crawley-based supplier of sound and communication systems to the retail and business sectors, specialises in providing tailored music solutions and over the years has devised a structured training programme for staff. Neil Abdool, managing director, told PLASA Publishing: "We are very proud to have won this award as it reinforces our commitment to our employees, and in turn our clients."

German audio specialist Sennheiser has opened its first manufacturing plant in the Western Hemisphere, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, following recent growth in the company's US sales. The 4,500 sq.m facility produces printed circuit boards for electronic assemblies, digital RF mics and headphones for the US market. This is the company's fourth plant, complementing two in Germany and one in Ireland.

Gary Orrell has joined NXT, the company behind the Surface Sound flat panel loudspeaker technology. Orrell began his audio career with Wharfedale Loudspeakers some 15 years ago before leaving to set up a hi-fi manufacturing factory under the name of SG Acoustics Ltd which within 18 months was taken into the International Audio Group (IAG) with Orrell as CEO. He joins the company’s commercial audio division with a brief to identify new market opportunities. Also joining NXT is Geoff Boyd who will oversee the development of the SoundVu licensees. Boyd, who is from the Caribbean, is a Physics and Chemistry graduate of Leeds University with post-graduate and post-doctoral research experience in Material Science at Oxford University. He co-founded Memotech - a UK-based PC company and more recently has been involved in selling high technology display systems into Japan.

As part of a £24million restoration programme to improve parliamentary procedures, the Houses of Parliament at Westminster have been equipped with the latest digital conference technology from Philips Communication, Security & Imaging. In use three days a week, MPs in the new chamber use the world's first entirely digital congress system which consists of 35 table-top Delegate Discussion Units using Philips Digital Congress Network. The system was installed by Westminster Sound Systems.

The International Audio Group has announced details of a senior management restructure which has seen the resignation of Stan Curtis from his position as chairman of IAG. Toshio Tamaki, previously president of the Sansui Electric Co, and more recently of Akai Electric Co, has been appointed as president of the Group. Appointed as sales and marketing director of IAG is Ryozo Takahashi. Promoted from the role of International sales manager within Wharfedale’s Pro Audio Division, Takahashi’s previous experience includes over 20 years in senior management at keyboard giant Korg. IAG say the moves are part of the on-going development and expansion of its consumer electronics programme.

BBM Electronics has announced that long-time Trantec director Chris Gilbert is to stand down from his position at the end of April, but will continue his involvement with the company in a consultancy role. As a consequence, Steve Bickford will take up the new position of sales and export manager, with Tim Riley taking on responsibility for marketing worldwide.

Martin Audio has introduced the Screen 2/2P system, which is aimed at small cinemas, preview theatres, screening rooms and post-production suites, and accommodates the various digital formats of modern films. Martin say the Screen 2, which can be run either active or passive (2P), exhibits low distortion, wide bandwidth and uniform coverage. Designed to be run bi-amped, the system uses a single 15in (380mm) LF driver, reflex-loaded with a single horn-loaded 1" (25mm) HF unit.Martin has also introduced the Effect 3R, a two-way passive surround system suited to medium-sized cinemas, screening rooms and under-balcony applications. It features an 8" (200mm) bass driver and a 1" (25mm) HF unit mounted on a 90 x 90 degree waveguide which controls directivity above 2kHz. The Effect 3R has THX approval from Lucasfilm. Both products have already debuted at the new Warner Bros screening rooms in London.

Sennheiser UK has started a student scholarship scheme at the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield. The scholarship is for students studying the two-year NFTS Diploma and specialising in Screen Sound. The first award, which covers full payment of fees and an allowance towards living and travel expenses, has been made this year to Robert Bourke, a final year student from Dublin (pictured with Sennheiser UK managing director Paul Whiting). Sennheiser UK started a similar scheme in 1998 for students studying the BA degree in Sound Technology at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts.

Pioneer has released the CMX-5000, an automatic-beat mixing twin-CD player for DJs. The CMX-5000 is similar to existing rack-mount CD player, but includes a number of developments. The CMX-5000 uses a sophisticated computer chip which analyses the beat of the music playing, adjusts the next track to match the beats per minute (BPM) and smoothly mixes one track into another. It also gives you a choice of four different blends and mix effects (standard cross-fade, cut, echo and zip). It can also auto beat mix seamlessly from any two tracks on the same CD. The CMX-5000 includes the features of the CDJ- 500 series, such as Master Tempo, Fader Start/Back Cue Play, seamless looping, re-looping, digital outs, super fast track search / track scan and a large jog dial. Another new feature is the transparent jog dial, which allows for a comprehensive data display behind each dial.

Avenger has released two new items for its Conductor and miniConductor show control systems. The first is a new driver designed for the BSS Soundweb which is being heavily used in conjunction with Avenger's Conductor at the Hannover Expo. The driver allows the Soundweb to perform fades when switching to another setting without the need for control from a PC running Soundweb software. Secondly, a new, slim eight-channel RS232-card has been added to the range of Conductor interface cards.

QSC will introduce a new Digital Signal Processing accessory module at the NSCA Expo 2000 in Las Vegas, April 27-May 1. The compact module offers two channels of independent DSP and attaches to the back of most DataPort-equipped QSC amplifiers, without taking up additional rack space. Each channel handles a wide variety of DSP functions, including high- and low-pass crossover filters, high- and low-pass shelf filters, signal delay, compression, peak limiting, six parametric filters, two-to-one mixer, signal splitter and more. Other features include 24-bit, 48kHz converters, contact closures to trigger configuration presets, post-DSP output signal for daisy-chaining signal to other amplifier inputs, memory backup, and power and signal presence LED.

Tannoy Professional has appointed a new distributor for the Republic of Ireland. The Entertainment Company (ETC) based in Swords, County Dublin, is now distributing Tannoy's entire range of pro audio sound reinforcement loudspeakers and electronic system controllers, including the new i5 AW ICT compact moulded speakers and the CMS110 BCE Active corner-mounted subwoofers.

Following months of speculation, has come the news that the distribution of BST pro audio products into the UK marketplace has been changed. Acoustic Solutions Ltd has been awarded the exclusive distribution of the BST line for the UK and Ireland. To coincide with the move, the company has also appointed Simon Parslow, formerly the UK sales manager for Ultrak, the parent company of BST products. His role will see him developing the sales of all Acoustic Solutions products alongside BST to the independent retail sector.