News

AMX Celebrates 30th Anniversary (9/7/2012)

From a Simple Idea to a Global Leader of Innovations

AMX, the leading provider of unified control and automation solutions, has announced its 30th year in business. The company will commemorate the milestone with events throughout the year.

“I know I speak for everyone at AMX when I say how grateful we are of our 30 year legacy,” said president and CEO, Rashid Skaf. “Around the world, award-winning AMX products are installed in hundreds of thousands of installations. I am especially proud of the company AMX has become and the innovations we have fostered over the years. I want to thank our customers, partners, friends and families for supporting our journey and look forward to what lies ahead in the next 30 years.”

In 1982, salesman Scott Miller was looking for that special, yet-to-be invented product. Miller was looking for a way to use a wireless garage door opener to control a slide projector. From his sales experience, he was convinced people would gladly give up being tethered to a slide projector and appreciate the ability to move around a room during presentations to help keep attention. Little did Scott know this concept would drive the vision of the company he and his wife Roslyn were about to found. He built the first run of MX20’s and sent several to customers with an ultimatum - ‘if you like them, pay me for them, if not, sent them back.’ With that, the AMX MX20 was born, launching not only a new business but an entire industry. AMX was primed to create products and solutions designed to make technology easier to manage and more enjoyable to use. “I still remember that night in 1982 when my wife and I celebrated the sale of six $200 remote controls for slide projectors – our first big order,” said AMX founder, Scott Miller. “The emotional rush I got from that $1237 deal really got me.”

For the next ten plus years, AMX employees helped create an open, dynamic corporate culture that enjoyed tremendous growth. But the growth was more than just increases in revenue. Focusing on solutions that enabled and excited, the company produced a wide variety of technology firsts that gained regional, domestic and international attention. Additional growth occurred as AMX spread its vision of simplicity and excitement to new markets and opportunities.

In November of 1995 the company became publicly traded on the NASDAQ® stock exchange under the symbol AMXX. By this point, the products and solutions available from AMX had been adopted by the majority of Fortune® 500 companies and a user's list of home installations that read like a global Who's Who. Shortly after, AMX made its first acquisition of AudioEase, Inc., as part of a strategy to enhance its penetration into the residential market. Shortly after, AMX continued residential expansion with the acquisition of PHAST, a Salt Lake City-based company.

Starting in 2001, the future president and CEO Rashid Skaf spearheaded a succession of innovative products that would again, forever change the landscape of the industry. The Modero® line of touch panels was introduced and quickly earned the reputation as the ‘controlling force.’ This would become an AMX flagship product family. Right behind that, AMX announced another important product, Resource Management Suite® (RMS), a software solution designed to enable customers to manage and control a limitless number of resources and services, all from a single point. In 2003, AMX expanded the NetLinx® line with the introduction of a whole new control platform comprised of integrated controllers boasting ultra-fast processing, reliable networking, and sizable onboard memory. This introduction was way ahead of its time and would also become a flagship product line and a core component in the company’s forward-thinking mission.

In March 2005, after bringing hundreds of revolutionary innovations to the marketplace, The Duchossois Group®, a privately held, family-owned company took notice and realised the potential to grow the company’s vision. “When we started looking at AMX, we immediately knew there was something different about this company, something special about the people and the way they designed products,” said Robert Fealy, President and COO of The Duchossois Group. “The explosion of digital media and the complexity of integrating various technologies and devices demanded elegant and intuitive solutions, and we were convinced AMX could deliver them. We also knew there was a natural fit between the values of The Duchossois Group and those of AMX. These values always place the customer first. We succeed only when our customer does.” Mr. Fealy is chairman of the board of directors of AMX and president, COO and director of The Duchossois Group, a privately-held company located in Elmhurst, IL.

In 2005, AMX announced the appointment of Rashid Skaf as president and CEO of AMX. Skaf certainly would shake things up by acquiring a total of six companies between 2006 and 2008 including Matrix Audio Designs, Inc., AutoPatch, Endeleo, Inspiration Matters, ProCon Technology, and Atrium Group Developments, Ltd. His spirit fuelled the growth of AMX into an enterprise with products spanning automation and control, signal and media management, hybrid switching, user interfaces, digital signage and more.

Today, as the AV industry moves towards an IP-centric model, AMX continues to lead the way with solutions that simplify networked installations and provide the ideal backbone for connected businesses and homes, highlighted by the Enova® DVX and Enova DGX switching families. And as AMX literally created the market for touch panels, it has reinvented the user interface again by designing the world’s first panoramic line of touch panels - the Modero X® Series, inspired by the worldwide love affair for touch-friendly usability made popular by the Apple® iPhone® and iPad®.

“This anniversary is especially exciting to all of us as we embark on a new journey with the introduction of the Enova family of products, setting a new standard for performance, affordability and ease of use,” said Skaf. “As is suggested in the name, Enova is the definition of innovation. Early response from customers has exceeded our expectations and I see this being the flagship line that will catapult us into the next 30 years.” AMX is launching a year-long celebration to commemorate the anniversary. Everyone is invited to visit the AMX30 Facebook page to share well wishes, favourite memories and pictures. But more importantly, to honour its dealers, distributors, customers, partners and employees - all of whom have been the most critical component for driving the company’s success.

www.amx.com/eu