3' min read
3' min read
"Ialways followed passion and pursued emotions, not money. And even today that I am 83 years old, collaborators call me to assess the sound quality of a new system, because you don't just hear with your hearing, but also with your soul'. Words that those who know Arturo Vicari know to be devoid of rhetoric, because it was when, fresh from his degree in electronic engineering at just 22 years of age, he abandoned his secure position at Olivetti to go around selling guitars that the founder and president of AEB Industriale followed his own path, in search of the perfect sound and the beauty of music..
In half a century - just celebrated - his company in Valsamoggia, on the outskirts of Bologna, forerunner of digital amplification technology with the dbTechnologies brand, laid the foundations of what is now one of the world's leading players in professional audio and public address systems: RCF Group. It is the result of the rescue, in 2004, of RCF, a historic company from Reggio Emilia that started 75 years ago with the first ribbon microphones and transducers, later joined by the American brand EAW and the Danish brand DPA Microphones. Vicari has given voice to the world's biggest music stars, from AC/DC to Vasco Rossi, from Lady Gaga to Andrea Bocelli, and now operates in over 130 countries, but it is in the cradle of Reggio Emilia that he has immortalised all the (acoustic) strength of which his group is capable, inaugurating the RCF Arena in 2022. Europe's largest open-air music venue, 200,000 square metres next to the high-speed railway and motorway, with a sound system of 410 RCF TT+ loudspeakers and 2 Megawatts of sound power that allows more than 100,000 spectators to hear clear, perfect sound, whether they are under the stage or lying on the lawn a hundred metres away.
"For us, the Arena is also the laboratory where we test our systems under the most extreme conditions; we are the only ones in the world to have such a facility among our competitors. To get the voice into the microphone with the same intensity to 100,000 people requires very sophisticated digital electronics, but that is not enough. You have to transfer emotions and it is to this mission that I have dedicated my life. And today I'm very happy because I see a company that couldn't do better than this,' says the CEO of the RCF group, which this year expects a turnover of 300 million (up from 250 million in 2023 and over 92% is export) with a thousand employees, 600 of whom are direct, and is forced to select customers due to excess demand, despite the 30% increase in production. Never before have people needed music and live shows as much as they do today, after Covid,' Vicari explains, 'and musicians have to do shows to make a living, because royalties with streaming platforms have been reduced to crumbs. 'Emilia is not just a land of motors,' he recalls, 'it is a land of music and high-end speakers, which are only made here and in a few other places on the planet and from here we export all over the world.
