's competitor,
Curtis Electromusic Specialties (CEM) E-mu Systems was founded in
Santa Cruz, California by
Dave Rossum, a
UCSC student and two of his friends from
Caltech, Steve Gabriel and Jim Ketcham, with the goal to build their own
modular synthesizers. Scott Wedge, who would ultimately become president, joined later that summer. In 1972, E-mu became a company, developing and patenting a digitally scanned polyphonic keyboard (1973), licensed for use by
Oberheim Electronics in the
Oberheim Four Voice and Eight Voice synthesizers and by
Dave Smith in the
Sequential Circuits Prophet-5. E-mu, along with Solid State Micro Technology (SSM), also developed several synthesizer module
IC chips, that were used by both E-mu and many other synthesizer companies. With the financial benefit of the royalties that came from working with these other synthesizer manufacturers, E-mu designed the
Audity, their first non-modular synthesizer, showing it at the 1980
AES Convention. With a price of $69,200 (over $200,000 in 2009 terms when adjusted for
inflation), only one machine was ever produced. At that same convention, Wedge and Rossum saw the
Fairlight CMI and the
Linn LM-1. Recognizing the trend of
digital samplers, they realized that E-mu had the technology to bring a lower-priced sampler to market. The
Emulator debuted in 1981 at a list price of $7,900, significantly less than the $30,000 Fairlight. Following the Emulator, E-mu released the first programmable
drum machine with samples built-in priced below $1,000, the E-mu Drumulator. The Drumulator's success was followed by the
Emulator II and
III, the
SP-12 drum sampler, and the
Emax series of samplers. Meanwhile, E-mu continued to develop electronic musical instruments, and in 1996, began introducing another series of 32-voice polyphonic, 16-part multitimbral sound modules along the lines of the Proteus series, each loaded with preset sounds designed for a specific music genre, and packaged in a 1-space rackmount unit. The first of these was the electronic
electronic dance music-oriented Orbit. In 1997, the
hip hop and
trip hop-oriented Planet Phatt and the
latin music-oriented Carnaval were introduced. In 1998, E-mu was combined with
Ensoniq, another synthesizer and sampler manufacturer previously acquired by Creative Technology. In 2001 E-mu's sound modules were repackaged in the form of the XL7 and MP7 Command Stations, a line of tabletop
music workstations, each featuring 128-voice polyphony, advanced synthesis features, and a versatile multitrack sequencer. A complementary line of keyboard synthesizers was also released using the same technology. Subsequent products from E-mu were exclusively in software form. In 2004 E-mu released the
Emulator X, a PC-based version of its hardware samplers with extended synthesis capabilities. While a
PCI card is used for audio input and output, the
algorithms no longer run on dedicated hardware but in
software on the PC.
Proteus X, a software-based sample player, was released in 2005. ==Non-Creative sound cards==