Was driving in SSH this afternoon to go to church when I saw a
billboard ad with the logo of Aowa. I’ve had bad experiences with their
sales people years back but the name already reminded me of the
electronics brand,
Aiwa.
Many years back, they were a growing and popular brand of cassette
players/recorders as well as home stereo system (boasting power outputs
as high as 16,000 watts PMPO). They’re supposed to be cheaper too
compared to the bigger brand names.
I’ve never heard of them for a long time now nor have seen any of
their products in home appliance stores. A quick search online gave me
the answers I was looking for:
<blockquote>The Aiwa Corporation slid towards bankruptcy until it was
purchased by competitor Sony Corporation. As of October 1, 2002, Aiwa
ceased to be a separate company and became a wholly owned division of
Sony Corporation.</blockquote>
Sony tried to revive the image of Aiwa and even re-focused it to the
younger segment of the market. That did not seem to pan out as well.
<blockquote>Since 2004 Sony has seemingly been rolling back its
support for the Aiwa brand and in 2005 Aiwa products remain on sale in
only selected territories around the globe. In 2006, Aiwa products were
discontinued and no longer sold in the market. {via
Wikipedia}</blockquote>
Anybody out there still has an
Aiwa cassette player or stereo system? Maybe that’s where the other Aowa brand came to be?