HAR Company Profile

Our Automotive segment designs, manufactures and markets audio, electronic and Infotainment Systems for vehicle applications primarily to be installed as original equipment by automotive manufacturers.
Our automotive products are marketed worldwide under brand names including JBL, Infinity, Harman/Kardon, Mark Levinson, Lexicon and Becker. Through engineering and supply agreements, our premium audio systems and infotainment product offerings are sold to a number of global automotive manufacturers including DaimlerChrysler, the BMW Group, Toyota, Audi, Porsche, Land Rover, Renault, Hyundai, Kia, the PSA Group and Volvo. Our Infotainment Systems may include voice-activated telephone and climate control, navigation, rear seat entertainment, Internet access, hard disk recording, MP3 playback, Windows Media Audio playback and a high-end branded audio system.

Our Consumer segment designs, manufactures and markets audio, video and electronic systems for home, computer and multimedia applications. Our Consumer products are marketed worldwide under brand names including JBL, Infinity, Harman/Kardon, Lexicon, Logic7, Mark Levinson and Revel. Our audio, video and electronic systems are recognized throughout the world for superior sound quality and high performance. Our home audio and electronic products are offered primarily through audio/video specialty stores and retail chain stores, such as Circuit City and Best Buy in North America and MediaMarkt in Europe. Our branded audio products for personal computer and multimedia users are primarily focused on retain customers. Our multimedia products are geared towards an enhanced sound for Apple’s iPodsOand other MP3 digital audio players and improve the appeal and capability of these products as entertainment systems.

Our Professional segment designs, manufactures and markets loudspeakers and electronics used by audio professionals in concert halls, stadiums, airports and other buildings and for recording, broadcast, cinema and music reproduction applications. We provide high-quality products to the sound reinforcement, music instrument support and broadcast and recording segments of the professional audio market.

We offer complete systems solutions for professional installations and users around the world. Our Professional brands include JBL Professional, Soundcraft, Crown, DigiTech, dbx, AKG, Lexicon, BSS and Studer.

We believe that we are uniquely equipped to provide turnkey systems solutions for professional audio applications that offer the customer improved performance, reliability, ease of installation and reduced cost. With our HiQnet networking protocol software, our Harman professional brand products can communicate and operate together.

Our results of operations depend on the sales of audio products and electronic systems in the automotive, consumer and professional markets. Our products are sold worldwide, with the largest markets being the United States and Germany.

We believe significant growth opportunities continue to exist with automotive manufacturers through higher penetration levels within existing models, increases in the number of models offering our audio, navigation and Infotainment Systems, supply agreements with additional automakers and increases in per-vehicle content through the provision of integrated Infotainment Systems with premium branded audio systems. We believe significant growth opportunities exist in the consumer electronics market as the home and multimedia technologies continue to converge. We believegrowth opportunities exist in professional markets and expect that our HiQnet system will allow us to capitalize on these opportunities as this technology simplifies the interaction of our products and provides users with an incentive to purchase complete HiQnet compatible systems.

Customers/Industry Concentration

We anticipate that DaimlerChrysler and BMW will continue to account for a significant portion of our sales and receivables for the foreseeable future. These automotive customers are not obligated to any long-term purchase of our products.

Competition

The audio industry is fragmented and competitive and includes numerous manufacturers offering audio products that vary widely in price, quality and distribution methods. Consumer home, computer, multimedia and automotive aftermarket products are offered through audio specialty stores, discount stores, department stores, mail order firms and Internet merchants. Automotive and computer manufacturers also offer branded audio products as options. Music instrument retailers, professional audio dealers, contractors and installers offer professional products and customers can also purchase these products on a contract bid basis. We concentrate primarily on the higher-quality, higher-priced segments of the audio market and compete based upon the strength of our brand names, the quality of our products, our ability to provide integrated systems and our comprehensive marketing, engineering and manufacturing resources.

In the automotive audio market, we compete against Bose, Pioneer ASK, Foster Electric and Panasonic in the sale of audio systems to automotive manufacturers and Alpine, Bosch, Panasonic, Siemens VDO, Delphi, Aisin Seiki and Denso in the sale of electronics and Infotainment Systems to automotive manufacturers. We compete based upon the strength of our brand names and the quality of our products.

We believe our competitive position is enhanced by our technical expertise in designing and integrating acoustics, navigation, speech recognition and human-machine interfaces into complete Infotainment Systems uniquely adapted to the specific requirements of each automobile model.

We believe that we currently have a significant share of the consumer market for loudspeakers, primarily as a result of the strength of our brand names and our technology. We believe JBL and Infinity are two of the most recognized loudspeaker brands in the world. By developing our high-end loudspeaker brand, Revel, over the past several years, we have extended our market position. Our principal competitors in the consumer loudspeaker market include Bose, Klipsch, Polk Audio, B&W, Boston Acoustics, KEF and Paradigm.

Competition in the consumer home electronics market remains intense, dominated by large Asian manufacturers. This market is characterized by the short life cycle of products and a need for continuous design and development efforts. Our competitive strategy is to compete in the higher-quality segments of this market and to continue to emphasize our ability to provide system solutions to customers, including a combination of loudspeakers and electronics products and integrated surround sound and home theater systems. Our principal electronic competitors include Yamaha, Sony, Denon, Onkyo, Pioneer and Marantz. We also compete in the luxury consumer electronics market with our Mark Levinson and Lexicon brands. Our principal competitors in this high-end market include Krell, McIntosh, Audio Research, Meridian, Linn and Accuphase.

In the multimedia market, we supply the Apple store and other retail chains with JBL and Harman Kardon speaker systems that serve Apple’s successful iPod as well as other MP3 players. Our principal competitors include Bose and Altec Lansing. We offer Harman/Kardon, JBL and Infinity brands to personal computer retail audio outlets. Our principal competitors are Creative Labs, Altec Lansing, LabTec/Logitich, Klipsch and Cyber Acoustics. Additionally, Harman/Kardon audio systems are built into certain Toshiba laptops. The new Harman/Kardon Drive + Play provides full MP3 control and interface for Apple’s iPod for the car along with a highly visible display. Our principal competitor in the MP3 accessory market is Alpine. This market is highly competitive and characterized by low prices and frequent product changes.

The market for professional sound systems is highly competitive. We believe that we have historically held a leading market position in the professional loudspeaker market and have complemented our professional loudspeaker line by adding digital professional electronic products and broadcast and recording equipment. We compete by utilizing our ability to provide systems solutions to meet the complete audio requirements of our professional customers. We offer products for most professional audio applications.

We compete in the sound reinforcement market using many of our brand names, including JBL Professional, AKG, Crown, Soundcraft and BSS. Our principal competitors in the sound reinforcement market include the Electro Voice division of Telex, Eastern Acoustic Works/Mackie, QSC, Sennheiser, Tannoy, Peavey, Shure, Audio Technica, Fender, Marshall, Sony and Yamaha. We compete in the broadcast and recording markets with our Studer, AKG, Soundcraft and Lexicon brands. Principal recording and broadcast competitors include Sony, Yamaha, Neve, Sennheiser, Denon, SSL, Shure, Tascam, Alesis and Audio Technica. In the music instrument market, competitors for our JBL, DigiTech, dbx, Lexicon and Spirit products include Yamaha, Peavey, Rane, Roland, Alesis, Marshall, Fender, Sony, Mackie and T.C. Electronics. We also compete in the industrial and architectural sound market. Competitors within this market include Siemens, Peavey and Tannoy.