Leading UK professional audio consultancy Yellow Technology has standardised on Van Damme cable across its high-end studio design and installation projects, with COO Ben Savage citing long-term reliability and consistency as essential in the mission-critical environments the company operates in.
Providing technical design, installation, maintenance and support services for recording, production post, education and podcast studio facilities, Yellow Technology has built its reputation on a consultancy-led approach. ‘We’re helping people, not shifting boxes,’ Savage asserts.
Established in 2002 by former senior London studio engineers Pete Eaglesfield and Antony Conner, the company was created to deliver independent, technically led support. That ethos continues to shape how every system is designed, specified and installed today, with Savage noting that their role is always to ‘look at what’s actually right for the application, rather than just supplying equipment’.
This thinking is key when it comes to infrastructure: ‘The wiring is the part that gets buried and forgotten, but everything runs through it,’ Savage explains. ‘It’s the first thing in, the last thing out; investment really matters.’
That focus on long-term performance is reflected in Yellow Technology’s approach to installation, with the company guaranteeing its audio wiring for life. ‘We guarantee all our audio wiring for life, so we’re not messing around,’ Savage says. ‘At that point, you can’t take risks with what you’re putting in.’
As a result, Van Damme has become the company’s default choice across new projects. ‘In practice, we seldom work with anything apart from Van Damme,’ he continues, citing ‘incredible longevity, a very high degree of uniformity, and the fact it’s easy to work with’ as key factors – particularly important given the team’s hands-on, traditional approach to wiring.
Van Damme’s Blue Series sits at the heart of the majority of Yellow Technology’s installations, from complex university facilities such as Royal Holloway’s multi-room recording studios, through to high-spec composer environments including the studio of award-winning composer John Lunn. ‘Those kinds of spaces involve huge amounts of routing and long-term daily use, ‘so consistency is absolutely critical,’ Savage notes.
The same approach applies to newer areas of work, including podcast production. At London-based Plosive, Yellow Technology delivered a discreet and highly flexible wiring infrastructure to support evolving audio and video workflows. ‘There’s been a massive boom in podcasting,’ Savage says. ‘It’s a relatively new sector, but there are considerable parallels with post-production, where we have decades of experience - the environments still need to be incredibly reliable and able to support fast moving workflows.’
Beyond traditional studio environments, the company’s work has also extended into specialist applications, including marine audio systems and public buildings. ‘You suddenly find yourself working to completely different regulations,’ Savage explains, ‘but you still expect the same performance.’ Even in these scenarios, he notes, ‘it’s very rare that we can’t do what we need with Van Damme.’
Alongside product performance, Savage highlights the importance of strong technical support when dealing with complex systems: ‘Our team are all highly skilled engineers, so when we speak to suppliers, we need to be able to talk at the right level,’ he says. ‘We’re not looking to be sold to; we’re trying to solve problems and having that understanding straight away saves a huge amount of time.’
Operating at the top end of the professional audio industry, Yellow Technology’s choice of cabling ultimately reflects its wider philosophy. As Savage concludes: ‘We’re working at the top end of the industry, and Van Damme matches our values - it’s as simple as that.’
‘VDC has a relationship with Yellow Technology going back years, and in my time dealing with the company, it has have nothing short of an absolute pleasure to work with,’ says Cameron Clark, Business Development Manager at VDC Trading.