Roland Announces New Global Headquarters
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Roland’s expansion comes amidst a global downturn, signalling the straight-to-Bad Gear company is actually doing just fine, thank you.
New Roland Headquarters
Roland today announced that it’s planning to construct a new global headquarters near its current HQ in Hamamatsu, Japan. The new building will bring together a number of divisions, including research and development, which are currently spread across a few different areas in the central Japan city.
New Roland headquarters · Source: Roland
Rather than start from scratch, the new headquarters will expand on a building already acquired by Roland. “The remodeling and renovation project will connect the building’s two existing sections to create a larger square-shaped structure with an open area concept at its core,” Roland said in a press release.
This open area, the literal heart of the building, will be an open atrium, the “Roland Arena”, with a performance space “that will be enjoyed by both Roland employees and the community.” This performance area sounds like the one in the current R&D Center, which is occasionally opened up to non-Roland employees. With the R&D department also moving to the new headquarters, this makes sense.
A Night At The Roland Museum
Currently, the R&D Center in Hamamatsu houses Roland’s museum. Unlike the one at Yamaha’s Innovation Road, also in Hamamatsu, the Roland Museum is private and not open to the public. It would be great if it could somehow be made available for public viewing, as there are a lot of cool products from Roland’s long history on show. It could also encourage more visitors to come to Hamamatsu, especially synthesizer and musical instrument fans.
New Roland headquarters · Source: Roland
Looking Beyond The Announcement
What does this announcement say about the state of Roland? For many companies, the past few years have been something of a rough time. After the unexpected spike in sales during the pandemic, when people had nothing better to do than shop online, things have taken a turn towards the austere. Worldwide inflation plus the rising cost of utilities have encouraged people to tighten their belts and close their wallets. We’ve seen how this has affected companies like Moog Music.
New Roland headquarters · Source: Roland
Roland, however, appears to not only be weathering the storm but thriving in it. Their recent retail store opening in Tokyo is indicative of this. We saw a similar thing happen in the late 1970s and 1980s, with American synthesizer companies like Moog, ARP and Oberheim suffering while the Japanese giants, including Roland and Yamaha, thrived.
While diversification is likely a large part of Roland’s modern success—Japanese companies tend to branch out into all sorts of areas unrelated to their main business—it’s also fair to say that Roland remains a popular and high-selling musical instrument company. This despite the many social media comments bemoaning the lack of analogue instruments and Bad Gear episodes featuring just-released Roland gear.
Construction of the new headquarters will begin in 2024 and is slated for completion in 2025. Now if we could only convince Roland to open their museum to the public.
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4 responses to “Roland Announces New Global Headquarters”
Roland are innovative and have produced great keyboards like the Jupiter 8 and the D-50 – magic! Long live Roland!
You seriously overestimate the effect of one YouTuber on the reputation of this great company. Roland has a history of delivering quality innovative products with good value. I hope they can continue to do so into the future. I/myself pay no mind to the analog this analog that debates. Either It fits my needs and sound good or not.
Everybody likes to jump on the hype train and speculate about companies. My wake-up call was when everybody thought Nintendo was done for after the wii-u, but look at them now. Even when it comes to the economy, I remember everyone thinking 2008 was the end of the world. I don’t fall for these types of lines any longer.
I have a Roland accordion. Will they still be made in Italy?