Behringer VSTs

[chk071]

Anyway, sure, i can't know for sure when i'm not involved in it. But, i really can't imagine that one of the department slows down the other, because, as i said, typically, those are split, not only in terms of employment, but also im management, planning etc. And, we're talking about Behringer here, who have 3.500 plus employees, and a whole city as a production facility.

TBH, it surprises me as well that they want to start developing VST's now as well, i always thought there was so little money to earn with soft synths that it wouldn't make sense, but, i'm sure Uli Behringer sees some potential. Curious about what they want to develop specifically.

[Forgotten]

Right, but you don’t know.

Some years ago I worked for a company that manufactures marine electronics, and many roles were co-located based on function rather than whether they were engaged in hardware manufacture or producing software products. There was also the concept of resource pools with development and QA, with movement across all products for individuals.

It’s very rare to see a strong demarcation like you’re describing, so not sure why Behringer would do it (especially as they apparently use a JIT manufacturing process).

[Stefken]

i always thought there was so little money to earn with soft synths that it wouldn't make sense

I guess there is some money to be made, but I doubt that this is Uli's main objective.
He's selling a TB-303 clone for 150 euro . I guess if he sold it at double the price, it would still sell well.

[DJ Warmonger]

...anybody here actually working somewhere in IT / tech company? I was waiting for some KVR plugin developer to step in and correct me, but nothing like that happened .

Yep, development teams are usually small, focused on particular products and field of application. And if Behringer is pushing new products every month, there must be a plenty of them working independently.

No, you can't put 50 developers in one room and ask them to develop a crap ton of plugins, yet alone sit them at production facility. Usually there will be max 5 software developers (not PMs and other supportive roles) working together on one thing, and before project ends some people will join or leave the company anyway.

[Stefken]

Usually there will be max 5 software developers .

A good size is about max 8 with typically a PM and an analyst, so yeah that sounds about right.

You could also have a team dedicated to creating and supporting a framework, that other dev teams then use for a specific project/synth. Arturia seems to work that way (I have no inside info but the consistency in their plugins seems to suggest a common framework).

[foosnark]

...anybody here actually working somewhere in IT / tech company?

Yeah... an engineering software company with a product mostly used by aerospace engineers; formerly the computer game industry (an MMO engine and tools, and if you go back another 12 years from there, actual games).

Even a multi-million-line project like some of the ones I've worked on don't tend to have many core developers. Like 3 or 4. Plus some people building secondary systems based on the core systems, and then more people using the tools and doing support and/or R&D. And given the long-term nature of a couple of these projects, some turnover, where you're maintaining systems that were built by someone who left 5 years ago and you slowly become the expert yourself... so maybe in total it was 20 developers

My personal guess is, a typical VST instrument or effect will have somewhere between 1 and 3 main developers, even at a "large" company. They are likely to leverage code from existing libraries and past projects in any place where it makes sense, both to save costs and time and for consistency within a product line. But those large companies will have more support staff, and more feedback going into an iterative design process.

[sin night]

I doubt making VA plugins fits in Behringer's vision, both because of that statement of a few years ago (ok, they may change their mind if they can conquer that market!) and because that could be in competition with their cheap analogue synths.

But Music Tribe is not limited to the Behringer brand. For example, they already have some plugin under their TC brand (and some of them, for example the TC2290-DT, are sold with a dedicated hardware controller).
They could use the programmers to create some "shamelessly digital" virtual instruments (for example a Wavetable synth or a software sampler), or effects, or editors... or even a daw, who knows!

I really don't know what to expect, but it looks like Music Tribe goal is to dominate the market (just look at what they did in the synth market in the last few years).
I may be wrong, but I don't think they are going to compete in the "cheap plugins" market; it's more likely they will take their time, build something "serious" (comparable to top developers in features and sound) and sell it for a very competitive price (like they are doing with synths). Maybe something that requires their hardware (both because they are an hardware company and to fight piracy)... Software is ubiquitous in today's studios, so they could be just trying to connect the missing dots in their portfolio...


With 50 people, Music Tribe could either:
- create a suite of plugins (so they have 7-10 different teams, each of them working on a different plugin line, along with teams dedicated to framework, graphic and maintenance)
- share the teams between the different brands of the group (they have more than Behringer and TC)
- use them to work on one or two big project, each of them with a few teams working on a specific area/feature.
- maybe other (I have no idea right now)

It's really difficult to speculate about their plans, they can do whatever they want with that amount of developers...


Maybe they will take their time before putting out any product and right now they are still thinking about the possible projects; but in the long time plans of the company it could have been worth to just employ them because they were a lot, with a background in the field and all of them coming from the same company (incidentally one of the most known/successful in the music software field)... Who knows!


I'm not keen on anything B-related, but I must recognise their results and vision, especially in recent years.

[CapnLockheed]

Well, they bought TC Electronic

Yeah.....that was a damn f#cking shame. As Mark Twain said:

“If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat."

[Tj Shredder]

If they are talking about making complete VSTi, then I doubt they could make enough money from it to justify the effort. If they are talking about VSTi editor/librarians for their analogue hardware synths, then that's the kind of thing that will sell more hardware and be easy to justify to shareholders. I would be about 1000 times more likely to buy a Pro-One and Odyssey clone if I had some way of storing presets. (Yes, one thousand times more likely.)

An now imagine a vsti which isn't just an editor but is also capable to emulate the hardware to a certain extend. Give it for free to the owners of the hardware or sell it for the same or lower price to "I stay 100% ITB" people. It would allow to be flexible with carrying hardware to gigs. The big gigs get the real sound the small ones can still be played...
The VCV concept seems to work for vendors of hardware modules. They sell for cheap or free emulations of their hardware, which seem to trigger more hardware sales than it prevents...

[ramseysounds]

i always thought there was so little money to earn with soft synths that it wouldn't make sense

You gotta be kidding?! With software, after development costs and maintenance all you’re doing is selling a licence. Id imagine profit margins in hardware are a lot less compared to software.

[flundstrom2]

...anybody here actually working somewhere in IT / tech company? I was waiting for some KVR plugin developer to step in and correct me, but nothing like that happened .

Yep, development teams are usually small, focused on particular products and field of application. And if Behringer is pushing new products every month, there must be a plenty of them working independently. Usually there will be max 5 software developers working together on one thing, and before project ends some people will join or leave the company anyway.

You are right : I've been working with embedded sw development for 20+ years in countless products, and - especially consumer sw - is "write once, ignore bugs".

If I were to set up a VST shop, ild hire one really skilled UI designer, one or two music-loving mathematicians that would work with Spice and Matlab all days to create the mathematical requirements for each VST. I'ld need one senior softare architect to design a generic VST solution, into which any junior Indian programmer could port and integrate the Matlab code. The architect could even be a consultant, that can be let go after the first three VSTs, leaving only the UI guy, math guy and junior programmer as full-time staff. With such a setup, it's easy to scale and it's possible to cram out loads of VSTs per year.

B has quite some knowledge in embedded development, DSP and sound processing already. So it'll be a piece of cake for them to take on VST development - it's no different from doing it in a mixer or synth. Actually easier, since the PC has "unlimited" cpu/ram/computing resources compared to a mixer or synth.

[chk071]

i always thought there was so little money to earn with soft synths that it wouldn't make sense

You gotta be kidding?! With software, after development costs and maintenance all you’re doing is selling a licence. Id imagine profit margins in hardware are a lot less compared to software.

Actually, not really. Unless you're really big, and selling respectively, there's not much in it.

[BONES]

An now imagine a vsti which isn't just an editor but is also capable to emulate the hardware to a certain extend. Give it for free to the owners of the hardware or sell it for the same or lower price to "I stay 100% ITB" people. It would allow to be flexible with carrying hardware to gigs. The big gigs get the real sound the small ones can still be played...

Yeah, I only buy hardware to use on stage, we don't record with it at all. I also have the Korg Odyssey already and RePro 1, so I'm good for high quality emulations. My desire is purely to own something I used to lust after 35 years ago, it's completely irrational.

[Tj Shredder]

My desire is purely to own something I used to lust after 35 years ago, it's completely irrational.

—— To be honest, the only reason I got the Arturia and Korg collections.... It looks irrational, but it is important to be emotional, and anything which triggers good memories is fine...
The emulation quality just has to be good enough.
I think the physical presence of the hardware has a bigger impact and cannot be emulated anyway unless you build way too heavy controllers...

[BONES]

Again, I have no good memories of 1970s hardware. It's more like nightmares which is why I wouldn't buy a real one, nor would I buy any of these with all the horrible limitations of the originals. The VSTis definitely go far enough for me.