Most work happens in Focal's main facility in Saint-Etienne. Focal also holds dear to a "made in France" mentality, with the vast majority of product design and manufacturing happening in-house. In fact, Focal is one of the only loudspeaker brands to manufacture its own drivers. FAQ What makes Focal different?įocal is one of the only companies in the world to continually invest in research, with research into speaker driver acoustics being its core activity. In 2003, Focal and JMlab were incorporated under the name Focal-JMlab for home products, before being rebranded as just Focal in 2005 for all product sectors.
#Slate digital audio utopia drivers
Focal commercialized speaker drivers for loudspeaker manufacturers, while JMlab specialized in high-fidelity loudspeakers. Soon, Mahul founded both Focal and JMlab.
In late 1979, a young engineer and tech journalist named Jacques Mahul began producing speaker drivers at his father's precision mechanics company in Saint-Etienne, France.
Focal's ultimate goal is exquisitely simple: to make every moment of listening to music a privilege for music lovers and audiophiles alike. Focal places a heavy value on acoustic expertise and developing exclusive technologies, investing great time and resources on research and development. Beginning with the Focal Utopia in 2016, Focal headphones are known as some of the best in the world. Armed with all of that knowledge, Focal then set out to develop headphones from the perspective of creating a miniature ported speaker for the head. For more than 40 years, Focal has been designing and manufacturing high-end home audio loudspeakers, car audio speaker drivers and amplifiers, monitoring loudspeakers for recording studios.