In slightly unexpected news this week, Barco, a Belgian company that specialises in AV projection has just snapped up the Focal / Naim brands for €135 million.
While Focal / Naim is a premium, even luxury brand, I think this deal is different from the spate of acquisitions seen over the last few years, where Bose bought the McIntosh Group, and Harman ate up Sound United.
Those were MA deals where brands were looking to move into more luxury areas of the market, as well as grab a foothold in the growing in-car audio market, too. I suspect that this deal from Barco is more about the custom install space.
Similar to the in-car audio market, this is an area that seems to be growing and growing, though not getting much attention in the mainstream market. But give Naim’s expertise with two-channel amplification, while Focal has pushed towards more immersive sound systems; Barco’s own knowledge in the projection market would make an obvious lining up of all these skills.
Your own private cinema
I can’t really speak to what’s driven interest in the custom install market but there’s increasingly more attention being paid to that area by brands.
Sonos has been a player in that space for years, releasing its Amp Multi as a solution to driving multiple speakers in a custom home audio set-up. Q Acoustics has been making forays into that area with its in-wall systems and speakers, as has Linn Audio and L Acoustics, which if you ever go to a music festival in 2026, you’re likely to hear sound through one of their speakers.
And let’s not forget the likes of Loewe, Sharp, JBL, DALI, all of whom were present at ISE 2026 with their professional AV solutions. I went to an event by a prominent British audio brand (which I’m not allowed to talk about yet) that had a prominent emphasis on custom-install and private cinema-based solutions. There’s even a whole awards show (CEDIA) that’s dedicated to this area of the market.
So it is growing, and given these systems can start in the range of a few hundred Pounds for a speaker, to tens of thousands for kitting out a private cinema, this is an area where there’s a lot of money to be made.
The pandemic has likely contributed to this growth, with people hunkering down in their homes rather than venturing out to the cinema, with video delivery systems such as Kaleidescape that can funnel films to your home network that are arguably even better in terms of quality than 4K Blu-ray.
So Barco’s purchase of Focal / Naim would seem, from what I can see, to be firmly entering an area where they can now offer the visual solution (with its projectors) and the audio solution (with in-wall/ceiling speakers), it seems like a match made on the silver screen. It’s a surprise that no one else made a bid for these brands.
What does it mean for Focal / Naim?
There’s no smoke without fire, and while we’ve seen this deal from Barco’s POV, it’s possible that Focal / Naim were inviting bidders on their part.
But I don’t think Focal / Naim will stop being Focal / Naim. They’re a luxury brand(s) that have done impressive work in the last few years with their streaming products, wireless speakers and large-sized active speakers – so I don’t see much changing on that front.
Focal already covers indoor and outdoor audio solutions – it even has audio solutions for boats, another area I could see Barco pushing into – and Focal has been developing in-car solutions for the likes BWM, Toyota, Tesla, Mercedes, Volkswagen, Ford and others.
I see the Barco deal enhancing what Focal / Naim already does and not mucking about with its DNA. And I imagine they’ll be a renewed focus on the professional side but considering it exists, and has existed, along with the commercial side for decades, I don’t imagine any disruption to headphones, wireless speakers etc
I could be wrong, but Barco seems to have bought Focal / Naim for what they represent now, rather than purchasing them as a means to turn them into something other than what they are. I sense a “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” attitude to this acquisition, which could be a good thing for the future of Focal / Naim.
