S’pore music entrepreneur Mah Chern Wei’s sound judgement

SINGAPORE — When you keep your ears to the ground and take a chance, something will eventually come up. That was, somewhat literally, the case for local music entrepreneur Mah Chern Wei.

Recently, there was news of international music giant Fender — makers of the iconic Stratocaster guitar — going into the headphone biz after acquiring Aurisonics, a Nashville-based boutique audiophile company that makes in-ear phones. It was a veritable coup for the five-year-old company and as part of Aurisonics’ small team, the Singaporean Mah had played a big role in getting the company where it is today.

And for him, it all started with a Skype conversation.

Back in 2004, Mah was selling electric bass guitars as a second year student at National University of Singapore’s Communications and New Media faculty. Seeing a market opportunity for high-end, niche, made-in-USA products, he began specializing on these types of products.

Fast-forward to 2012 and he decided to diversify and work on a new product category. Back then, headphones and earphones, of which an estimated 290 million units were sold globally last year, were taking off. After a bit of snooping around, he came across the then-fledgling Aurisonics, which made in-ear monitors, a high-end type of earphone that musicians, audio engineers and hardcore audiophiles use in the studio or live performances, or to simply listen to music.

Seeing the potential, Mah decided to drop company founder Dale Lott a line, asking if he could sell it in Singapore.

“I took a chance. We had a Skype conversation and just clicked right off the bat,” Mah recounted. “Little did I know the company was just two guys in a basement back then, but it didn’t matter. We had a good product, a good story and a good brand.”

Business would prove to be brisk. Over the next four years, Mah helped to grow the business — and his career, as well. From simply handling retailing in Singapore, he eventually started to manage all of the international sales for Aurisonics, and became a partner in the process.

Considering Aurisonics was essentially a humble start-up with a limited marketing budget, the company focused its resources on building its brand by combining cutting-edge technology with old world craftsmanship to make products that fit and sound better than anything else in the market—while still being a personable company.

“Focusing on these has made us a cult brand with an awesome online fan base that just kept our business growing through word of mouth,” Mah explained. “That being said, we also had fantastic distributors who believed in us and invested the necessary resources to grow our brand in their respective markets.”

Mah believes that now that Aurisonics is part of Fender, its ability to make better, more innovative products has increased exponentially.

“We hope that our products will continue to make a meaningful, positive impact in our customers’ lives and also the company’s growth and development. The sky’s the limit,” he said.

And all of that by simply keeping his ears to the ground.

For more information on Aurisonics and Fender products, visit http://aurisonics.com/ and http://intl.fender.com/en-JP/features/in-ear-monitor-series, respectively.