Yamaha electronics have proven to be successful, popular and respected products. Yamaha Corporation is also widely known for their music teaching programme that began in the 1950s. As of February 1, 2008, Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH operates as a subsidiary of Yamaha Corp. The acquisition of Bösendorfer was announced after the NAMM Show in Los Angeles, on January 28, 2008. Yamaha intends to continue manufacturing at the Bösendorfer facilities in Austria. Group BAWAG to purchase all the shares of Bösendorfer, intended to take place in early 2008. On December 20, 2007, Yamaha made an agreement with the Austrian Bank BAWAG P.S.K. Ltd, the UK piano sales & manufacturing arm, was unaffected.
In July 2007, Yamaha bought out the minority shareholding of the Kemble family in Yamaha-Kemble Music (UK) Ltd, Yamaha's UK import and musical instrument and professional audio equipment sales arm, the company being renamed Yamaha Music U.K.
In January 2005, it acquired German audio software manufacturer Steinberg from Pinnacle Systems. Six archers in five different Olympic Games won gold medals using their products. In 2002, Yamaha closed down its archery product business that was started in 1959. The Yamaha PSS-14 and PSS-15 keyboards were upgrades to the Yamaha PSS-7 and were notable for their short demo songs, short selectable phrases, funny sound effects and distortion and crackly sounds progressing on many volume levels when battery power is low.
In the late 1990s, Yamaha released a series of portable battery operated keyboards under the PSS and the PSR range of keyboards. The complex including shopping area, concert hall and music studio. Yamaha Ginza Building in Tokyo, the largest musical instrument store in Japan. It bought a majority stake (51%) of competitor Korg in 1987, which was bought out by Korg in 1993. Yamaha purchased Sequential Circuits in 1988. In 1988, Yamaha shipped the world's first CD recorder. Yamaha made the first commercially successful digital synthesizer, the Yamaha DX7, in 1983. Yamaha released the Yamaha CS-80 in 1977.
Yamaha has grown to become the world's largest manufacturer of musical instruments (including pianos, "silent" pianos, drums, guitars, brass instruments, woodwinds, violins, violas, celli, and vibraphones), as well as a leading manufacturer of semiconductors, audio/visual, computer related products, sporting goods, home appliances, specialty metals and industrial robots. Also, in 1954 the Yamaha Music School was founded. In 1955, the success of the YA-1 resulted in the founding of Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd., splitting the motorcycle division from the company. It was a 125cc, single cylinder, two-stroke street bike patterned after the German DKW RT 125 (which the British munitions firm, BSA, had also copied in the post-war era and manufactured as the Bantam and Harley-Davidson as the Hummer). The YA-1 (AKA Akatombo, the "Red Dragonfly"), of which 125 were built in the first year of production (1954), was named in honour of the founder. Īfter World War II, company president Genichi Kawakami repurposed the remains of the company's war-time production machinery and the company's expertise in metallurgical technologies to the manufacture of motorcycles. The company's origins as a musical instrument manufacturer are still reflected today in the group's logo-a trio of interlocking tuning forks. The first piano to be made in Japan was an upright built in 1900 by Torakusu Yamaha, founder of Nippon Gakki Co., Ltd. In 1900 the company started the production of pianos. (currently Yamaha Corporation) was established in 1887 as a reed organ manufacturer by Torakusu Yamaha in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture and was incorporated on October 12, 1897. Torakusu Yamaha, founder of Yamaha Corporation.