NLS HiFi

According to David Kay when I asked if they were ever produced:
They never went into production. They made less than a 100. ... The idea for it was a collaboration with his top electronics technician, Sam Messin. They were both audiophiles. We had only MacIntosh stereo systems in our house when I was a teenager, the Non-Linear days.
That was one of his first attempt at a consumer product and as I explained earlier marketing was not his forte.

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Non-Linear Systems, Inc., originator of the digital voltmeter for electrical measurement is diversifying into consumer products.
Its first entry, appearing late this year, Is a "Rolls Royce quality" stereophonic receiver.
Andrew F. Kay, NLS president, said the receiver will be the first of modular design, also featuring the high standards of reliability and performance to which industrial users of digital voltmeters are accustomed.
NLS is not aiming at a mass market. Its receiver will retail at $695 vs. about $350 to $450 for most good quality receivers. Kay, a stereo fan, claims the NLS product is rivaled in quality by only one other, more expensive unit.
Marketing plans are incomplete. Present intentions are to work through "regular distribution channels for this type of equipment" in some markets, and through NLS salesmen or sales representatives in some 75 per cent of U.S. markets.
Although consumer marketing is far removed from Non-Linear's industrial channels, Richard C. Wynne, vice president-marketing, is convinced profit-making volume can be generated.
Intense competition in its digital instrumentation specialty prompted the diversification move. Last year NLS made the first layoffs since its founding in 1952. Last April, it replenished working capital through a $1.1 million sale and partial leaseback of its 109-acre plant property near the fairgrounds here.
It has built back to some 275 employees from a low of 250 reached about 90 days ago.
The privately owned concern, Kay said, is in the strongest financial condition in its history with a better than 2-to-1 ratio of current assets to current liabilities and with net worth in excess of debt.
With an order backlog of $1.1 million, NLS expects to post sales of more than $6.5 million in this fiscal year ending Aug. 31 vs. slightly under that level last year.
Results of the stereo venture will not be reflected in fiscal 1965 sales. The first 10 sets built have been on test nearly six months, the first pilot run of 100 is under way, and production of 1,000 more is to start in October.
Kay said the capital outlay so far is a modest $50,000.
Sam Messin, a five-year [clipping does not include continuation]
(The San Diego Union Financial News, Carl Plain, 1 August 1965>

Technical Article

Electronics August 9, 1965 article