Audio Video News

Harman International, the Samsung-owned powerhouse behind JBL, Harman Kardon, Mark Levinson, Revel, and Arcam, has agreed to buy Masimo’s Sound United division for $350 million in cash. If regulators sign off, the sale should close by the end of 2025—just three years after Masimo stunned the market by paying roughly $1.0 billion for the very same collection of brands. For home-theater enthusiasts, the headline isn’t the price swing; it’s what happens when Denon and Marantz AV receivers, Polk Audio and Definitive Technology speakers, Bowers & Wilkins luxury models, Classé electronics, Boston Acoustics, and the HEOS multi-room platform all move under the same roof as Samsung TVs and Harman’s own audio lineup.

The fit is obvious. Denon’s X-Series and Marantz’s new Cinema receivers are already fixtures in living rooms and dedicated theaters, thanks to their fast HDMI 2.1 rollouts, DTS:X and Dolby Atmos support, and Dirac Live upgrade paths. Polk’s MagniFi soundbars, Definitive Technology’s Mythos architectural speakers, and Bowers & Wilkins’ Formation wireless models likewise cover every surround-sound price point. Add HEOS—arguably the most mature whole-home streaming ecosystem outside of Sonos—and Harman gains an instant play in multi-room audio that can dovetail with Samsung’s SmartThings platform and Q-Symphony TV/soundbar trickery.

The fact that Harman is acquiring these assets for roughly a third of what Masimo paid underscores how badly the med-tech firm misjudged its leap into consumer AV. Masimo’s share price plunged about 35 percent the day the original deal was announced, activist investors forced a board shake-up, and the audio division soon looked like a distraction from the company’s hospital-monitoring core. By late 2024 Sound United had been spun off as a separate unit and was officially on the auction block. Harman, which itself became part of Samsung in 2017, emerged as the most logical suitor: it understands low-margin consumer hardware, it already has premium car-audio contracts with every major automaker, and it can promise the R&D muscle these legacy hi-fi and home-theater brands need.

Still, challenges await. Harman must keep four AVR lines—Denon, Marantz, JBL, and Arcam—from cannibalizing each other while preserving each brand’s identity. Denon is likely to remain the mainstream workhorse pushing the envelope on HDMI and gaming features; Marantz will continue to court design-conscious cinephiles with minimalist styling and robust power supplies; Arcam can focus on the custom-install channel and high-end cinema rooms. Polk Audio and Definitive Technology give Harman much-needed volume in the mid-priced speaker and soundbar market, while Bowers & Wilkins serves as the aspirational halo to compete with KEF, Focal, and Wilson.

HEOS may be the real gem. It already supports 24-bit/192 kHz streaming, simple AVR grouping, and voice-assistant agnosticism. Folding those capabilities into Samsung TVs, Galaxy phones, and SmartThings could finally deliver a top-to-bottom ecosystem that marries high-performance surround sound with mass-market convenience. Whether Harman re-brands HEOS, merges it with its existing Music Life app, or lets it stand alone will be one of the first big strategic decisions to watch.

Assuming the deal clears, 2026 model-year gear is where consumers will start to feel the impact. Expect joint engineering teams to chase tighter lip-sync over eARC, more elegant wireless rear-channel options, and perhaps even some cross-pollination between JBL’s pro-cinema tuning and Denon’s room-correction wizardry. For now, the takeaway is simple: some of the most beloved names in surround sound have found a new home in a company that lives and breathes audio—and that’s good news for anyone building the ultimate home theater.