Howard Ladd

Howard Philip Ladd (1921-2015) was an electrical engineer, inventor, marketer, entrepreneur and bank founder.

Ladd was a pioneering giant in American and international consumer audio and video electronics.

The founder of Concord Electronics, Ladd was largely responsible for the introduction and acceptance of personal audio and video tape recorders in the US.

As Executive Vice President and COO of the Sanyo Corporation, Ladd managed that brand's highly successful US introduction as well as managing its subsidiary Fisher Electronics.

Ladd was the first of two sons born to Augusta Gertrude (née Feiner) and David Ladd (Ladezinsky) in Providence, Rhode Island on April 5, 1921.

Ladd attended Overbrook High School and graduated from Germantown High School in 1938, both in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Ladd married Louise F. Lieberman in 1942.

He was later married to actress Lara Lindsay.

Ladd graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1942 with a degree in electrical engineering and earned an MBA from the Wharton School of Business.

Howard's prowess as a businessman and interest in technology were further developed during his four years in the U.S. Navy during WWII.

Among many engineering projects, he was integrally involved in the development of radio controlled target drone aircraft.

Upon his release from active duty, Howard visited Los Angeles and moved there.

The ten years after WWII saw Ladd actively involved in the formation of several businesses including a Southern California toy company.

His great interest in technology led him back to electronics, setting him on the path to become a world business leader in the design and manufacturing of electronic equipment.

Ladd founded Concord Electronics, developing and marketing the first reel-to-reel and stereo audio compact cassette tape recorders that were sold in the U.S..

Most notably, in the 1960s, his Concord 5-inch reel-to-reel recorder was an entirely novel and innovative piece of electronic audio equipment.

Ladd’s tape recorder became one of the most successful products in the electronics industry at that time.

In 1965, Concord offered the Concord F-20 "Sound Camera" tape recorder.

The unit used 2.5-inch tape reels with a rim-drive tape transport.

It could record 20 to 30 minutes of audio.

The F-20 was featured several times during the opening sequence of the Mission Impossible television series between 1966 and 1973.

By 1966, Concord offered 18 different models of reel-to-reel recorders.

For the next decade, Concord Electronics continued to innovate consumer recording products including the first portable, battery operated tape recorder with a built-in radio.

Concord produced the Conrad NAV-1 Marine Navigation System, licensing the patented process from inventor Daniel I Schneiderman.

Schneiderman was a Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist and was project manager of the Mars Mariner program and Ranger program.

The device allowed boaters to quickly pinpoint their position and correct compass heading without using math.

Ladd was a pioneer in producing personal video tape recording equipment.

In 1966, Concord introduced the VTR-600 video system at the Los Angeles High Fidelity Music Show.

The three-piece system included a push-button, helical scan video recording unit, a nine-inch monitor and a Concord video camera.

Ladd said the system was designed to meet the needs of professional communicators and wasn't aimed at the home market.

The system retailed for $1500.

In 1968, Ladd sold Concord Electronics to the New York based Ehrenreich Photo-Optical Industries, the exclusive US importer of Nikon photographic equipment.

The transaction cost Ehrenreich Photo-Optical Industries 44,000 shares of their common shares of stock.

Additional payments were to be made "on the basis of future earnings".

Ladd remained with Concord as president for a year.

In 1969 Ladd became the Executive Vice President and COO of the Sanyo Corporation.

In 1969, Fisher Electronics was acquired by Emerson Electric, who moved Fisher's manufacturing operations to Hong Kong due to high labor costs, but the company continued to suffer quality problems.

Ehrenreich Photo-Optical Industries sold the Concord Electronics brand to Benjamin Electronic Sound Corp., a subsidiary of the New York based Instrument Systems Corporation in 1970.

Ladd introduced the Sanyo brand to the United States in 1970.

Raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Ladd died on July 7, 2015, in Los Angeles, California.