The People Involved

Several people were involved in the development of the 25W amplifier. This chapter takes the history from the perspective of the people involved, in chronological order.

A Finnish professor named Matti Otala (also here). On sabbatical at Philips in Eindhoven, together with Jan Lohstroh he designed a TIM-free amplifier. It was one step in Otala’s quest against the new distortion called TIM, and later DIM.

Svein Erik Børja, a Norwegian broadcast and record producer, heard the presentation given by Dr. Matti Otala at an AES conference in Copenhagen in 1973. Together with Nils Jørgen Kjærnet at Nera he built two units based on the Otala/Lohstroh schematics.

Per Abrahamsen was contacted by Svein Erik, who knew him from his Mojo Blues days, and also knew that Per had an audio/electronics company. Per was mostly working with PA equipment, but the arrival of the Otala amp turned his company, Electrocompaniet, into an audio company.

At this time several others were involved with the company, but I don’t remember all of them, mostly because they were before my time, and also because they slowly disappeared as the company changed from a PA company to an audio company. Among these were Petter Hjerpseth and Klaus Væthe Jr. The latter later became a good friend of mine, and we tried to make an audio company together in 1983, with the help of Paal Rasmussen, my former partner at NRF — more on that later. Petter disappeared during 1975; Klaus stuck with the company on and off until sometime in 1977/78.

I (Terje Sandstrøm) first turned up in late 1974, and started to visit EC on a monthly basis. After half a year of this, Per told me we were both better off if I started to work for him, instead of just spending his time. In the beginning I mostly did assembly work, but during 1975 I worked myself up the ladder, and later I did more and more of the theoretical work on the amplifier, calculations and so forth. I stayed until 1979, but did some part time work and consulting for EC until 1982.

It is important to note that Svein Erik stayed with the company as its Golden Ear for a very long time. In a way this was his hobby!

Peik Borud entered the company in 1976. He was an M.Sc. engineer in electronics, and an audio freak. He stayed throughout 1978, and was, together with Per and me, one of the basic designers of the 25W amplifier in this period. Peik did a lot during his time at EC.

Paal Rasmussen entered the company in 1977 and stayed on and off for slightly less than a year. He came from Seas AS, a loudspeaker company, and before that he had worked in England with several of the famous designers there. He and I were two of the three who started The Norwegian Radio Manufacturing Company in 1979 — more on this later.

Kjell Winther was our record provider, and got amplifiers in return. He was also a hi-fi nut, working in a record store, and provided us with the latest and best-sounding records for our sound tests.

Nils Kvam was a record producer who also worked with listening tests and also provided opportunities for the company sales-wise. He is still working with EC.

Øistein Klevhus helped me with the Engineering High School (I was rarely present …), and I got him a part-time job at EC from early ‘78 (or late ‘77) until spring ‘79. We did the School Amplifier together, spring ‘79.

Two of the people in production who really stayed for a while were Knut Arne Jacobsen and his then-girlfriend Aud. There were also a couple of girls who came from Tandberg to work in production — (their names are not remembered). These also stayed for quite a while.

There were also some sales and managing people (Helge …, Jan Richter, among others) involved from period to period. I’m working on re-remembering their names. Any help from others is appreciated.

Others who contributed included, for example, Svein Erik’s brother, Bjørn Børja, from Seas AS, who designed a cute little moving-coil amplifier that EC manufactured for some time.

During 1979 the company moved, I started my way out, other people came in, and I don’t recall their names, sorry. However, the first era of the Otala amplifier ended sometime in 1979-1980, and the new Electrocompaniet appeared. It moved to Skårer, where it is still located.

This text was originally written some time in the late 1990’s, and minor updated around 2005.