Do you hear what I hear

MANILA, Philippines – Koh Onozawa places his phone on top of the newest model of the Loudbasstard bamboo speaker and music fills the room. Right now, he is into the greats like Louis Armstrong, as well as his new discovery, Leon Bridges.

The 26-year-old Loudbasstard president and CEO says he has always loved sharing music – he was that guy who would always be organizing special playlists, burning CDs and sharing mixtapes. “Sharing that love of music was something I wanted the brand to represent,” he says.

The new model, a sleek rectangular bamboo box, is the world’s first hybrid speaker, with both electric and non-electric features. “It’s very social,” Onozawa says as he lifts his phone from the speaker and the music stops streaming out of it. “You can easily switch and share.”

He envisions the speaker being used by a group of friends hanging out or at a party perhaps, sharing each other’s favorite songs by simply placing their phones or music players on top of the speaker.

If not charged, the hybrid model works much like Loudbasstard’s usual bamboo amplifier, with a slot in the wood to place the phone in, that helps channel and direct the sound.

Together with the hybrid speaker, Loudbasstard has also recently launched limited edition conch shell speakers made from shells sourced from the Gulf of Mexico. Onozawa got the idea to use these shells during one of his travels. “It’s a diet staple there, so there were mountains of conch shells, and they just toss it,” he says. Just like the original bamboo speakers, the novelty of the shell makes for an awesome-looking speaker.

Riding on a simple idea and design, Onozawa did not expect the success that the bamboo speakers have reached today. Loudbasstard has been receiving international recognition and distribution and Onozawa has been a finalist for the Mansmith Market Masters Award and was named GoNegosyo Young Inspiring Entrepreneur for helming the company.

Most recently, the hybrid speaker received the Highest Design Quality Award at the SPOT Design Awards in Hong Kong.

Onozawa says, “I think it’s pretty cool that people are using it as a verb – they say ‘Just Loudbasstard it’” when they mean using the bamboo speaker or any other object that works similarly.

Onozawa had been “Loudbasstard-ing” years before, when he was working full time as an archeologist. “It was always something I used to do back in the day when I worked on site,” he says. Music being an essential part of his daily life even back then, he would play music on his phone and use a bowl or cup to amplify the sound, especially when there was no electricity when he worked in the field.

“When I was home in Cebu we just decided to design something for it,” he says. “We got good comments from our friends and family, and the next step was to commercialize it.”

Manufacturing and selling the bamboo speakers was more like a huge leap than a step for the archeologist.

Since he did not have background in business, he had to learn everything as he built his company, including, he lists, “doing a lot of market research and learning how to manage people, which I think are the company’s best assets.”

The archeologist-turned-entrepreneur says, “You have to build the right team to keep on growing.”

And Loudbasstard has indeed grown into an internationally recognized brand. At the same time, its ability to share the music has also grown significantly.

For their first anniversary celebration, Loudbasstard partnered with Cebu-based Sistemang Pilipino to make their classical music program more sustainable.

Through the program, public school students are given the opportunity to learn musical instruments.

Onozawa recalls the story of John Paul, a boy who lives in a mountain barangay and has to make a two-hour trek and motorcycle ride just to reach the school where he gets his music lessons. “One day his mother told him not to go to school anymore. So he climbed a tree and refused to go down until he was allowed to go back and play the violin,” he says. “Now he’s performing.”

Loudbasstard has also reached out to the deaf community through the Philippine Accessible Deaf Servies Inc. lead by president JP Maunes, to implement the foundation’s assessment, distribution and maintenance of hearing aids for bene?ciaries in Cebu, in a program called Note for Note.

The company has also supported sign language school for deaf children and their hearing parents. Onozawa remembers meeting a 15-year-old beneficiary who, together with his mother, learned to sign for the first time. “Can you imagine, they hadn’t spoken in 15 years and now they can finally communicate with each other.”

2015 has seen the company turning up the volume in their corporate social responsibility project.

“We are going to absorb the NGO into our headquarters,” Onozawa says. “This way, they have ownership in our projects as an enterprise and we have ownership in their projects for social impact, empowering both my employees and their staff to work as a single unit.”

Onozawa hopes that he can inspire more young entrepreneurs by sharing his experiences in putting up his business. “The start-up scene is still in its infancy stages, especially in Cebu. There’s not a lot of access to funding or mentoring.”

He been making the rounds at SME summits, pushing entrepreneurship and using Loudbasstard as an example of how a very simple product executed well can uplift a community. Onozawa has represented Cebu at the Chiang Mai Creative Entrepreneurship Workshop in Thailand and was a speaker at the Asian Consortium for Social Entrepreneurship this year.

He advises, “Execution is more important than a brilliant idea. Even if you have a great idea, some people are not willing to do the work. You have to be resourceful. It’s not easy – it’s the most difficult job I’ve ever had – but with high rewards too.”

Onozawa still occasionally finds himself out on the field as an archeologist. “It’s my passion too,” he says, “but I’m even more passionate about music and now, business.”

He adds, “What I am really advocating for is entrepreneurship. Education is the way to alleviate poverty in our nation, but it is through entrepreneurship that we can really empower ourselves.”