Sequential

What Sequential does

Sequential is a privately held, San Francisco-based musical instrument design and sales company. Founded in 1974 by Dave Smith — a recognized pioneer in analog synthesizer design and co-creator of the MIDI standard — the company specializes in the design and commercialization of electronic musical instruments under the Sequential brand, a name with deep historical equity in professional synthesizer culture tracing back to the original Sequential Circuits lineage.

The company operates with a small team of 1–10 employees, consistent with a boutique, high-end instrument maker business model. Its core products historically center on analog and hybrid synthesizer architectures targeted at professional musicians, recording studios, sound designers, and high-end hobbyists. Distribution is implied to occur through the company's own website (sequential.com) and a likely network of musical instrument dealers and distributors, though the supplied input does not detail specific channel mix, pricing tiers, or unit economics. No product catalog, pricing model, or revenue mechanics were disclosed in the source data.

Data on revenue, pricing, customer composition, partnerships, recent product launches, and other strategic activity is sparse in the supplied input; the company website returned only a verification/loading page at the time of data collection, and no third-party financial, funding, or partnership information was available. Beyond the founder designation for Dave Smith, no management team, board, or investor information was provided. The description above should therefore be treated as a baseline characterization grounded in the firmographic and leadership fields only, with material gaps acknowledged in subsequent analytical sections.

Name

Sequential

Website

https://sequential.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

1974

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Sequential is a privately held, San Francisco-based musical instrument company founded in 1974 by Dave Smith, specializing in the design and sale of synthesizers and electronic instruments for professional musicians, studios, and sound designers.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Musical Instruments

NAICS

Musical Instrument Manufacturing (339992), Musical Instrument and Supplies Retailers (459140)

SIC

Musical Instruments (3931)

akta.pro primary industry

Music Production Hardware (Synthesizers, Drum Machines, Samplers, MIDI Controllers) (MPAIAJAE)

akta.pro secondary industries

Musical Instruments (Acoustic & Electric) (MPAIAJAA), Pro Audio & Recording Equipment Retail (MI-adjacent) (CRALAEAC)

Keywords

• Synthesizer design
• Electronic musical instruments
• Music hardware manufacturing
• Analog synthesizers
• Professional audio equipment

Headquarters

HQ city

San Francisco

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Hardware or Manufacturing

Cost components

Supply Chain, Operations, Technology or R&D, Personnel, Marketing or Sales

Core offering

Sequential specializes in the design and sale of musical instruments. The company produces electronic musical instruments, most notably professional-grade synthesizers, serving musicians, producers, and audio professionals seeking hardware-based sound design tools.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Musical Instruments Electronic musical instruments designed and sold by Sequential, serving musicians, producers, and audio professionals.

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Emerging players

• Behringer: Behringer has aggressively released low-cost hardware synth clones of classic Sequential, Moog, and Roland designs. While it competes only on price and scale rather than design pedigree, it has reshaped the affordable end of the same market Sequential addresses.
• Novation: Novation, part of Focusrite, makes hardware synths and controllers (Peak, Summit, Bass Station). It targets a similar electronic-music creator audience with more affordable price points, making it adjacent rather than head-to-head with Sequential's premium line.
• Pittsburgh Modular: Pittsburgh Modular is a small US-based boutique synth and modular maker (Taiga, Voltage Lab). It targets a similar prosumer electronic-musician segment with a comparable small-team, design-driven identity.
• ASM (Ashun Sound Machines): ASM is a boutique maker of the Hydrasynth series, a digital/wavetable polyphonic synthesizer that competes in the same premium hybrid-synth segment as Sequential's Pro 3 and Prophet-6. Smaller and more recent than Sequential, but directly competitive.
• Make Noise: Make Noise is a US-based boutique modular synthesizer and shared-system platform maker (0-Coast, Maths, QPAS). It serves the same adventurous electronic music community as Sequential but specializes in modular/Eurorack rather than polysynths.

Broad incumbents

• Korg: Korg is a major Japanese musical instrument manufacturer with a broad synthesizer and keyboard lineup (Minilogue, Prologue, Wavestate, MS-20). Although much larger and broader than Sequential, Korg is comparable because it sells premium polyphonic synthesizers to the same professional and prosumer market segments.
• Roland: Roland is a large Japanese instrument manufacturer whose iconic synth families (Juno, Jupiter, System-8, Boutiques) directly target Sequential's market. Roland is a broad incumbent with a much wider product portfolio but is among the most direct competitive threats in the high-end synth category.

Direct peers

• Arturia: Arturia is a French manufacturer of hardware synthesizers (MicroFreak, MatrixBrute, PolyBrute) and one of the leading music software plugin makers. It overlaps directly with Sequential on premium hybrid synths and competes for the same prosumer audience, while extending further into the software-defined market.
• Elektron: Elektron is a Swedish boutique hardware maker of analog/digital hybrid synths, samplers, and sequencers (Analog Four, Digitakt, Syntakt). It targets the same professional electronic music producers as Sequential with similar price points and a comparable boutique, design-led ethos.
• Moog Music: Moog is the closest direct peer to Sequential — both are US-based boutique synthesizer manufacturers focused on premium analog and analog/digital hybrid instruments sold to professional and prosumer musicians. The two companies compete head-to-head in the high-end polysynth and monosynth categories and share the same customer base.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat2 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights5 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/sequentialllc
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/sequential-llc

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Sequential