Ex-Xbox gros fromage joins wireless speaker whizzkids Sonos Microsoft’s chief Xbox product officer Marc Whitten has joined streaming Wi-Fi speaker biz Sonos as its chief product officer. A note on Xbox Wire said: “The Xbox team is sad to share today that Marc Whitten, Chief Product Officer (CPO) of Xbox, will be leaving the team to become Chief Product Officer of Sonos.” Whitten …
Sonos needs somebody like this on board as they move away from being a niche product, available thru specialist resellers to a mass market product that you can pick up on Amazon or at any branch of Best Buy.
The recent launch of the Playbar was the first time Sonos has really let down customers. With only an optical audio connection to the TV supported, many buyers were left without the "home theater" surround sound they expected and the lack of DTS support left many in silence when watching blu-rays.
Despite votes from around 1500 customers, the 3rd most popular customer request, Sonos (after a decision that took almost a year) refused to pay the licensing fees for DTS and let its customers down. The door slammed shut on buyers and they didn't take it well.The outburst that followed forced Sonos to close the related thread on the ask.sonos.com site to prevent further discussion from customers.
Xbox is no stranger to letting customers down. It launched Xbox One with only DTS support and no Dolby Digital, the precise opposite to Playbar. And of course who could ever forget the 360 red ring of death?
Despite these failures, the Xbox brand get growing and people kept buying. In contrast, Playbar is currently on a special deal through resellers. It's very unusual to see a Sonos product discounted outside of the holidays...go figure.
Any plans to integrate Sonos and Xbox are pure speculation right now and years away from reality. Sonos don't even have a product with an hdmi connection right now and, until they do, none your suggestions are practical - right now connecting Playbar direct to your console isn't even supported.
Having somebody who knows how to manage future products seems to be just what Sonos needs right now.
We’re thinking the obvious thing first, which is direct Xbox sound output to Sonos.
Why is this "obvious"? Why do you think he'll make decisions that will favour a company he no longer works for?
He's on the pay-role of Sonos now - so I'd say the obvious thing would be him making decisions that benefit Sonos, not necessarily Microsoft.
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