Native Instruments - Behind The Brand

Simon Cross, Chief Product Officer at Native Instruments, chats to Sam Inglis ahead of NAMM 2025, going into detail on the company history, philosophy and offering hints of future product releases at Native Instruments.Chapters00:00 - Introduction00:18 - The History Of NI01:41 - Grouping Of Brands03:11 - Supporting Other Manufacturers05:04 - The Kontakt Sound Libraries06:16 - Choosing Which Sound Libraries To Include07:07 - Musical Differences Across Territories08:48 - Collaborating Across Different Timezones 09:51 - The Company Structure10:45 - Subscription and Perpetual Options 13:40 - Incorporating AI Technology To Manage Sounds 17:05 - Kontakt 8 / Offering Synthesis And Sampling 18:55 - Utilising User And Developer Feedback For Kontakt20:44 - Partnerships With Other Developers 23:52 - Native Kontrol Standard (NKS)26:44 - Extending The MIDI Spec28:25 - The Intergration Of Hardware And Software29:22 - The Future Of NI And The Industry In GeneralNative Instruments BiogNative Instruments was founded in Berlin in 1996 and for over 25 years they have been at the forefront of musical innovation, creating software and hardware products for music producers, audio engineers and DJs. Their portfolio contains industry leading products such as Komplete, Kontakt, Maschine and Traktor.In June 2023, iZotope, Brainworx and Plugin Alliance became part of the Native Instruments family, providing them with increased engineering capabilities across integrated software and hardware, AI and machine learning, cloud and more. Today, Native Instruments have offices in Berlin, Langenfeld, London, Paris, Boston, Los Angeles, Tokyo and Shenzhen.https://www.native-instruments.comSam Inglis BiogEditor In Chief Sam Inglis has been with Sound On Sound for more than 20 years. He is a recording engineer, producer, songwriter and folk musician who studies the traditional songs of England and Scotland, and the author of Neil Young's Harvest (Bloomsbury, 2003) and Teach Yourself Songwriting (Hodder, 2006).Catch more shows on our other podcast channels: https://www.soundonsound.com/sos-podcasts