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Tom Conrad is the CEO of Sonos, the consumer audio company known for its wireless speakers, soundbars, and the Ace headphones.
The software now has a name and a year attached, Sonos 27, plus an AI voice assistant and an MCP port that lets outside agents drive the system. The hardware arrives in September 2026 to prove it works.
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Two years after the app rewrite that Thurrott calls Sonosgate, Sonos wants $699 for a soundbar and $449 for headphones, and the most convincing part of the pitch is the free update that lands three weeks earlier.
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Tom Conrad says the company acted like a pure hardware business while shipping software that could sink the brand. The repair he describes is structural, and that is the part other product teams can actually copy.
Reality
In a demo TechRadar watched, a carried pair of Play speakers joined a Beam Ultra over an ultrasonic handshake with nobody touching the app, which moves the truth about your setup out of software and onto the furniture.
Reality
Filings for Ace Ultra headphones and a Beam successor are documents you can read. The assistant meant to make them matter is still a line from an earnings call.
Reality