Show Report: AXPONA 2025: The Best Show Yet

AXPONA 2025 was a great show, with 10,910 attendees, more than 700 manufacturers, retailers, distributors, brands from all over the world, thousands of products, and more exhibition booths than ever. Oliver Masciarotte and photographer Kurt Close flew through the more than 200 listening rooms on 12 floors to prepare this show report with what’s new and notable.

Recently announcing their formal introduction to the U.S. market with a new website and the availability of its three first loudspeakers, the Viotti One, Cesti B and Cesti Tower bookshelf and tower models, MarkAudio-SOTA wants to invite audio enthusiasts to hear the difference in their designs. The company combines the talents of a team of experts from UK, Italy, China and Japan, to produce new loudspeakers designed from the ground up, with new drivers, crossovers and cabinet design.

Fern & Roby, from Richmond, Virginia, designs audio speakers using heart pine timber, sourced locally, resulting in beautiful and unique products. The company currently sells The Beam full range tower speakers and the compact bookshelves, The Cube. Both are designed and engineered with vast attention to detail and result in extremely attractive products.