Rotel Michi – behind the scenes of a “mad science project” and the rebirth of a hi-fi legend

Back in 1993, Rotel gave its engineers a license to go wild and design a no-compromise range of hi-fi electronics that was above and beyond anything that the brand offered at the time.

This line became known as Michi. Japanese for “the path” or “ the way”, Michi was initially intended only for its home market of Japan, but beyond all expectations, it went global.

According to Daren Orth, CTO of Rotel, the range “added technology and raised the bar over standard Rotel products of the time. It elevated the brand up to premium hi-fi – then it disappeared.”

Why, you might wonder? Daren continues, “The Michi technology that launched in the 1990's quickly made its way into Rotel products and this was coupled with challenges of the redwood side panels of the mechanical parts of Michi. Thus, the short run of product”.

After a 26-year hiatus, the brand burst back onto the scene in 2019. And, seven years later, it’s fair to say Michi is now back in business and looking to grow.

In fact, it has recently expanded, with the introduction of the Michi Prestige Series, a line of more affordable yet still premium Michi products that sits above Rotel’s 15 Series.

And What Hi-Fi? was invited to go to hear the new range in person at Rotel’s headquarters in Zhuhai, China (the company was originally founded in Japan but has moved a couple of times over the years).

While there, I sat down with Daren to chat about the road to Michi’s revival and how he sees the brand evolving in the future…

Pushing boundaries

I start by asking Daren what the catalyst was behind bringing Michi back…

“In 2016 I started a project with my engineering team – just a conversation: how do we do something better? Is there a better platform, a better set of technologies, is there something we should look at and consider doing?

“There was no product, no spec, no name, no series, no price. It was a skunkworks internal project. I told them to look at the DACs, look at components, power-supply technologies... They just started engineering, and there were no bounds – it wasn’t like ‘I need a distortion of xyx’, it was just let’s make something better.

“So they spent the next two years in R&D and engineering, spinning prototype boards – they had three different manufacturers of DACs, five different DACs on the boards, swapping them out, measuring, listening, and acoustically working through it. It was kind of a mad science project.

“The engineers were still doing their day jobs, but at the end of it, it was like I think we got something.

“It was pretty cool – and expensive, because there were no limits. And now it was a case of what are we going to do with it? Seriously, there was no plan, but we wanted to know how far we could push our own boundaries. We weren’t trying to compare ourselves to anybody else. There was no need to get to this level of a competitive product.

“Internally, it was called Rotel's 30 Series because we have 14 Series, we have 15 Series.

“We went to the UK and hired a design firm and said, ‘Look, we built this, what are we going to do with it?’ So we spent two years working with them on designs and iterations and looking at the heritage and the history, trying to make it elegant but clean and simple.”

And it wasn’t cheap. Daren explains, “This was millions of dollars of tooling and investment and prototypes and samples.”

He says they were six months away from pulling the trigger on the 30 Series – the product still said Rotel on the front – and then the penny dropped.

“We realised we had done what those engineers did 35 years ago. So it had to be Michi. So we rebooted the whole thing and had to update all the documents.”

Daren thought his team was onto something, but there were questions that still needed answering. How many were they going to sell? He felt there was a market, but was also nervous over how it would be received and whether it would be seen as a price point too far for Rotel.

He needn’t have worried. “We brought this into Amsterdam in 2019 in a private suite. We had the P5/S5 (pre- and power-amps), and we had the mono block, and it was the moment of truth. I’d just spent three years, and a lot of our owner’s money to build this and put it in there on a plinth. So we brought the dealers in, and they were in awe.

It launched and, in Daren’s words, “took off”. “Then it was a case of what are we going to do next, so we went back and spent the next 18 months building the X3 and X5 integrated amps.”

It turned out Michi had found itself in a great sweet spot. “We launched series 2 (of Michi) two years after launching the original, and then the Q5, which we just brought out last year. It was super scary because who launches a $5000/$6000 CD player? But it’s been really well received.”

Indeed, our own Rotel Michi Q5 review concludes by saying it’s “beautifully made and delivers a tempting combination of insight, power and delicacy”.

What’s the ceiling for Michi?

I ask Daren how high he thinks Michi might go, especially when you see the prices some high-end hi-fi demands.

“If you had asked me that last year, I would have said I think we’re there. Ask me this year, though, and I think there’s still 25%, still something above that.”

Daren seems wary of setting his sights too high, but shows he’s confident in what Michi can deliver, too. “I think we have a $14,999 capable product, and I think we can do it.

Come back in three years, and I’ll want to say the ceiling is $19,000. But it’s that step where you want to add value, but you don’t want to be so eccentric that it becomes absurd. That’s disrespectful, I think, to the brand.”

But it’s not all about going more expensive, as Daren continues. “I think there’s an opportunity to lift and elevate Michi, but I also think there’s an equal and even greater opportunity to reach down to a slightly more attainable audience.”

Where does Michi Prestige fit in?

And this, it seems, is the thought process behind its new Michi Prestige Series, a new range of more affordable Michi components costing between £3599 / €3999 / $3999 and £4499 / €4999 / $4999 which sits above Rotel’s 15 Series.

It sounds like a potential recipe for conflict between the two brands – but Daren has clearly thought about this.

“This was a risk. If we execute this wrong, we have a huge issue because I’ve alienated the Michi customers I have today. We want that secondary lifestyle market that doesn’t necessarily want to step into that more expensive Michi range.”

So what did they go for with the Prestige Series in terms of design, engineering and sound?

“It’s a bit of a contrast to typical Rotel, which is bent, painted steel, the way it’s folded – these are typical assembly build techniques.”

Having seen the new Prestige Series in the flesh, I can vouch for the fact it does have the look and feel of something very different and more premium compared with Rotel’s current line-up.

“There were a lot of discussions,” says Daren. “Do we just use Michi parts? Are they the best parts? Is there something else we could try?

“We didn’t have the same budget, but the engineering team looked at it, challenged themselves at every component level and said how do we really tune this to be a 2026 initiative and not a refreshed 2019 product in just a different chassis.

“So there was a bit of work involved, but we think you get the same Michi cleanliness and the same Michi feel.”

It hasn’t all been smooth sailing, though – the Q430 is running a little behind the X430, and Daren explains why.

“This is my fault. I was here in December, and we were doing the final listening. I said that sounds really, really good; but I want it to sound great. So we literally pressed the reset button and gutted the entire product. We updated it with a different DAC, power supply and a different layout.

“We were getting ready to build it in three weeks, but I said we just needed to stop and rebuild the entire product.”

Daren is confident they made the right call, “Now it’s dynamically, dramatically, delivering a huge lift in performance.”

He also says that reassessment didn’t change the price of the Q430, but it did add cost to it. If the new Prestige Series can have as big an impact as its more expensive siblings, it could be money well spent.

MORE:

Rotel’s Michi Prestige Series hi-fi electronics kicks off with a stereo amplifier and CD player

Hands on: Rotel Michi Prestige X430/Q430 review

Read our full Rotel Michi X3 review and our Michi Q5 review