- A world-wide operating company

Just after a few years the German brand with American roots is already internationally renowned.

In America, Ground Zero has been the leading manufacturer of subwoofers with large surrounds. Today the global Ground Zero enterprise (supplying 38 countries in Europe alone) offers a complete palette of products in seven series: Iridium, Titanium, Radioactive, Hydrogen, Uranium, Nuclear, and Plutonium with over 220 car hi-fi products - all designed in Germany.

The Ground Zero brand, which is trademarked world-wide, is one of the world’s most respected names in car hi-fi power. The best evidence is provided by comparison-tests in independent trade magazines in which the Ground Zero products have consistently placed by the winner’s circle with best ratings for price / performance, features and quality.
Ground Zero also has the goal of keeping prices stable, no matter how prices of materials fluctuate. As an “add on” often there are additional features, which our competitors may just dream off. Therefore we don’t need to negotiate a “discount surcharge” off the price because the products are constantly “face lifted”.

- Story of success

1995
The company Ground Zero was founded in 1995 in Frankfurt, Germany, by Karl F. Lautner and Peter Unterharnscheidt under the name of Ultimate / MaGmA GmbH. The name taken from geology, MAGMA was symbolizing the raw force of a volcano. Ground Zero is the denotation for the ground of a volcano's crater.

1977
The American amplifier guru Bob Carver introduced a fully active home subwoofer under the brand name Sunfire, which was unlike anything before: it had an exorbitant huge surround.
This new Sunfire also attracted the attention of the MaGmA team headed up by Lautner and Unterharnscheidt. They recognized the advantages of this construction and acquired the sales rights for Europe under the name “Ground Zero”.

In 1997
The search for a new factory lead MaGmA to a German emigrant, Thilo Stompler, who had formed an American company, TC Sound. MaGmA and TC Sound cooperated closely and created a new edition of the beloved Ground Zero woofers. Aluminum cones, tireless spiders and woven-in leads helped to create a level of stability which was – up until then – unheard for subwoofers. It is still unbeaten!

In 1999
The company moved to the town of Egmating (pop. 2,000) near Munich.
The Ground Zero product became increasingly recognized and gained significantly higher market share compared with more conventional car hi-fi companies.

By 2000
Karl F. Lautner and Peter Unterharnscheidt had recognised that their brand, Ground Zero, could be expanded to include car hi-fi power amplifiers and speakers. But this could only be done by meeting the same quality expectations that were used for Ground Zero subwoofers. They designed the line extension with extra features and state-of-the-art engineering.
Ground Zero products have always distinguished themselves because of that extra investment. The power amplifiers convinced with their “inner values” – their functionality and timelessness.

2003
The company has been re-named to Ground Zero in order to emphasize that the company is not only the distributor but also the manufacturer of these excellent products. All rights for the brand name “Ground Zero” and the respective trademarks are registered world wide.

2004
The manufacturing has been relocated in the Far East where Ground Zero finally found a manufacturer capable of producing the voice coil that would meet their strict requirements. The result was the new Ground Zero quad coil woofer, model GZPW 15XQ.
While other quad coil woofers primarily offer flexible impedance, Ground Zero’s GZPW 15 XQ had an entirely different goal: to have an immense load capacity making it possible to operate them with four high performance power amplifiers equalling 10,000 watts! This would allow the user to extract even the last decibel of high level reserve out of the woofer – along with the further advantage that it can be used in an extremely small enclosure.
For this sound pressure other products need double as much cone area, if not the double cone diameter…

2005
Ground Zero manufactured the meanwhile legendary SPL woofers from Nuclear and Plutonium series. These woofers are able to provide unbelievable SPL Power ratings up to 10.000 W. Numerous world records in many classes of dB Drag competitions were setted up with those GZ – SPL Subwoofers – almost countless awards of the specialized press followed.

2006
The company and its employees moved to the especially built company building including an own warehouse near Munich.

2007
Due to their long achievement in subwoofer designing, Ground Zero has been voted to „Best Brand“ at the renowned reader’s choice of the German autohifi – magazine.
By the end of the year, the speakers of Hydrogen-line have been completely renewed and valorized with cast baskets, Kevlar- cones and high quality crossovers. Since that time, these speakers achieved top marks at every test of the specialized press.

2008
The next highlights from Ground Zero were developed in this year. Consistent with the great success in subwoofer – SPL range, Ground Zero managed to launch power- packs in amplifier section never been seen before. The car hifi world was amazed by the 11.000 W SPL competition amplifier GZPA 1.10000SPL – later the competitors despaired of the 22.000 W competition power of GZPA 2.20000SPL. Many awards for this amplifier followed – “High end amplifier of the year 2008” and “Strongest amplifier every measured by autohifi” are only two of them.
But Karl F. Lautner and Peter Unterharnscheidt don’t wanted to rest on those great results in extreme SPL section – the development of one-of-a-kind sound quality products were already going at full blast. So Ground Zero came out with the Plutonium Reference line to the turn of the year. Handmade speakers, crossovers “Made in Germany”, selected parts and noble materials are just a few keywords describing this product line.

2009
The high end quality of Reference line was certified several times by the specialized press in this year. The pure SQ amplifier GZPA Reference 4 was declared as the leader of reference class ranking list (autohifi) and new sound reference (Car&Hifi), the components of the Reference speaker system achieved likewise excellent results.
If someone thought, Ground Zero would not be able to develop even stronger SPL subwoofer and amplifiers at that time, he was surely disabused by Ground Zero in 2009. The subwoofers from plutonium range are now available in EXTREME versions. These subwoofers keep, what their name promises – with a special carbon cone they are made for extremely high mechanical power rating and maximum pressure. In the amplifier segment, the next step has been taken with the GZPA SPL – HC amps. Those extreme powerful high current amplifiers are equipped with a six fold power supply.
In September 2009, Ground Zero found a strong partner for the distribution of their products in Germany and Austria – the well known company Hama GmbH & Co KG is now the exclusive distributor for both countries.
 

- Perspectives

The most significant company maxim was, is, and will remain: maximum operating safety, longevity and sound quality of the Ground Zero products in every market with every model. These are the points that make a well known and appreciated brand out of Ground Zero.

The result has been gratifying: an excellent brand image known for quality and innovation, rising sales and satisfied customers and dealers, both. Now the company headquarters is bursting at the seams thanks to the positive order situation and the abundance of the team’s market-driven ideas.
The course has been set: The car hi-fi world now anxiously waits to learn what new and pleasurable audio experiences Ground Zero will bring them in the future.
 

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