Audinate Annual Report – 2022

The Audinate Annual report for 2022 is out. In recent years, the constantly growing company has managed to maneuver themselves into an interesting position. There are not many examples that come to mind where a proprietary technology has been adopted so heavily across the Pro Audio industry. Dante is now baked into all the best gear though. Mixers, recorders, wireless equipment and tons of other hardware. It is often absolutely central to the designs themselves of many complex AV systems. In many cases, there is simply not a drop in replacement or alternative that would provide the same functionality that Dante does.

As far as their products go, they are obviously great. The ability to network audio in (near) real time across simple networks, using off the shelf hardware is really incredible. It is not that they haven’t earned their success or that the product isn’t fantastic. It just raises some questions. Primarily, is having one company’s technology holding so much of the industry together going to play out well over time for end users?

Today for example, Audinate just announced new price structures, including both subscription and perpetual licensing for DDM (Dante Domain Manager). Those plans can now cost up to $4k per year for the Platinum level (for campus sized systems). Seeing this, it is hard to imagine they won’t continue down this road in the future, as it is easy new revenue. For DDM, large customers will just pay the price. Small customers generally don’t need DDM, but that doesn’t mean they haven’t also felt the squeeze, as Audinate raised prices across the board in FY22. Prices going up 10 – 25% for many of their other products is celebrated in the report.

Those numbers might be interesting if you’re planning a big system purchase soon. How much core functionality are you trusting to Audinate products? Can you trust those features will continue to work in the future without subscription fees? What if Audinate’s relationship with your favorite manufacturer changes in the future? When corporations get big and investors are at the helm, anything can happen.

As it stands, although they are quiet about it, Yamaha is a 10% shareholder in Audinate. Do you think their products get priority over others for ongoing development and support? It’s hard to know.

We obviously cannot predict the future. We can however read the annual reports. Each year, Audinate talks openly about where they are & where they hope to take the company next. If more people took the time to read these reports and the other resources the company provides, there would be far less confusion and speculation in Facebook groups and online forums.

The 2022 report came out in September & is provided with previous years reports at the line below. They are always an interesting read.

https://investor.audinate.com/investor-centre/?page=financial-reports