What with the daily news being what it is these days I generally avoid the negative when it comes to hifi.
After all this is a hobby centered around the enjoyment of music but it’s also a business for many and when you mix people and business you can run into unreasonable behavior. At least according to my experience which includes employing about 200 IT professionals back in the day when I was the co-owner/CFO/COO of an IT consulting firm where we had to deal with some unreasonable behavior with help from the law firm we had on retainer. All to say I have some experience when it comes to legal matters and business.
I chose to cover this news because you can read the complete and detailed AXISS Audio lawsuit for yourself and make of it what you will, no need for gossip. I’ve included links to both the Legal Notice posted on the Axiss Audio website as well as a link to the complete lawsuit (PDF) below for those who want to dig into the details.
Here is an excerpt from the Legal Notice written by Cliff Duffey, owner of AXISS Audio:
This is a public filing and is very detailed. We wanted to set the record straight. Here are the main aspects of our defamation claims:
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- Statements that AXISS chose to not provide a refund to a certain Soulution customer who had asked for a refund are false. As our complaint explains, this customer had purchased their products from Michael Bovaird at Suncoast Audio and not AXISS. It was Bovaird’s Suncoast Audio business who decided when and how much to refund to their customer, not AXISS Audio.
- Statements that a Soulution 717 blew up and caused physical injuries to this customer are also false.
- Statements that this customer’s Soulution 717 destroyed his Rockport Lyra speakers is false. As detailed in our lawsuit, although this customer’s speakers did have tweeter damage, AXISS Audio and Soulution extensively tested this customer’s 727 preamp and 717 power amp. This testing included over 50 consecutive hours of play on AXISS’s own pair of Rockport Lyra speakers and during which no faults could be found.
This is unfortunate news and I hope the concerned parties are able to come to a just resolution as quickly as possible.
I will point out that I’ve reviewed a number of products from two brands that fall under the AXISS Audio distribution umbrella—Gauder Akustik and Soulution—and was very impressed (you can find them on my list of Favorite Amplifiers and Favorite Speakers we well as on The Short List for Amplifiers and Speakers). AXISS Audio is also an advertiser here on TM.