Harman/Kardon

Harman Kardon was founded in 1953 in Westbury, New York, by two engineers, Dr. Sidney Harman and Bernard Kardon, who set out on their own with a shared ambition: to bring genuine high-fidelity sound to everyday listeners, not just technical enthusiasts. With $5,000 invested each, the pair built their first product, an FM tuner, and within a year had launched something genuinely groundbreaking.

That product was the Festival D1000, widely regarded as the world's first compact AM/FM hi-fi receiver — a single chassis combining a tuner, preamplifier, and amplifier at a time when high fidelity meant a room full of separate components. It was a genuine turning point for home audio, described by Harman himself as leaving listeners "trembling" at sound they'd never before heard in their own living rooms. The innovations kept coming: the 1958 Festival TA230 stereo receiver, the acclaimed 1959 Citation II tube amplifier, and the 1970 CAD5 cassette recorder, one of the first consumer products to feature Dolby noise reduction.

Now part of Harman International, Harman Kardon has carried that founding mission into home theatre, wireless speakers, and automotive audio, with systems built into vehicles from Land Rover to BMW. Seven decades on, the company's guiding idea remains the one Sidney Harman and Bernard Kardon started with: high fidelity, made genuinely accessible.