7. Sustainability in Audio: How Stockholm-based design brand Transparent is making audio home systems sound greener for today’s music lovers. In conversation with Martin Willers, CEO & Co-Founder Transparent.

My guest today is my new friend Martin Willers. We are both part of the Swedish music tech community STHLM Music City. Martin started the boutique design firm People People in 2009 with a group of friends. During ten years the firm started the lean hardware movement in Scandinavia, designing several wearable tech startups focusing on innovation, design and sustainability. They got voted one of Europe’s hottest startup by Wired magazine and was in 2018 acquired by the Swedish design firm Doberman (That, in turn, is now acquired by Ernst & Young.)

In 2014 he co-founded Transparent, with several successful campaigns on Kickstarter, the latest, The Light Speaker. Their products are sold in the worlds best designs stores and shown in music videos from artists like Will.I.Am, Britney Spears, Robyn and Snoop Dogg.

Martin is an active public speaker on the topic of sustainable innovation and has given talks to tens of thousands of people, globally. He has a Bachelor degree in Visual Communication at the University of South Australia, another Bachelor degree in industrial design at Umeå Institute of Design.He has also been the
thought leader at the crowdfunding site Kickstarter,and editor of the Swedish Design industries sustainability guide. 

In this episode, Martin and I discuss the ins and outs of sustainable design in audio systems, and when sound experience, meets sensorial lightning.

SOUNDBITES