James M. Fosgate (born December 5, 1937 in

Indianapolis, Indiana Indianapolis (), colloquially known as Indy, is the state capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the seat of Marion County. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the consolidated population of Indianapolis and Mari ...

) was an American inventor, engineer and businessman. The self-taught son of a television and radio repairman, Fosgate invented the first car amplifier in 1973 and founded Fosgate Electronics, now called Rockford Fosgate. Since his departure from Rockford Fosgate in 1981, Fosgate has remained active in the audio world, running Fosgate Laboratories and leading the team that created

Dolby Pro Logic II Dolby Pro Logic is a surround sound processing technology developed by Dolby Laboratories, designed to decode soundtracks encoded with Dolby Surround. Dolby Stereo (also known as ''Dolby MP'' or ''Dolby SVA'') was developed by Dolby in 1976 f ...

. Fosgate was also the developer of one of the finest

quadraphonic Quadraphonic (or quadrophonic and sometimes quadrasonic) sound – equivalent to what is now called 4.0 surround sound – uses four audio channels in which speakers are positioned at the four corners of a listening space. The system allows for th ...

decoders, the TATE II 101A (see

Stereo Quadraphonic SQ Quadraphonic ("Stereo Quadraphonic") was a matrix 4-channel quadraphonic sound system for vinyl LP records. It was introduced by CBS Records (known in the United States and Canada as Columbia Records) in 1971. Many recordings using this techn ...

for details), in collaboration with

Peter Scheiber Peter Scheiber is a classically trained musician and audio engineer. He is considered to be the originator of multichannel ''matrix'' audio formats, a mathematical formula used to convert four audio channels into two and back again. Scheiber i ...

and Martin Willcocks, which was superseded by his 3601 decoder.

Audio career

Collaborating with four channel matrix pioneer Peter Scheiber early on gave Fosgate's company the edge to become one of the leaders in the Dolby Surround market. In 2003 Fosgate received an Emmy Award for the development of surround sound for television.''

Stereophile ''Stereophile'' is a monthly American audiophile magazine which reviews high-end audio equipment, such as loudspeakers and amplifiers, and audio-related news. History Founded in 1962 by J. Gordon Holt. ''Stereophile'' is the highest-circulation ...

'', Jan 2, 2005
INTERVIEWS, Jim Fosgate: Of (Surround) Sound Mind - Steve Guttenberg
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fosgate, Jim Businesspeople from Indianapolis 20th-century American inventors American audio engineers Living people 1937 births