Ortofon
A Danish maker of phono cartridges for turntables, founded in Copenhagen in 1918.
- Founded
- 1918
- Founded by
- Axel Petersen and Arnold Poulsen
Why it is renowned
Ortofon is the largest maker of magnetic phono cartridges in the world, with about 500,000 sold a year, three quarters of them to DJs.1 Its OM cartridges are fitted as standard to turntables from other makers, and its SPU has been made in new versions since 1959.1
The story
The engineers Axel Petersen and Arnold Poulsen founded the Electrical Phono Film Company in Copenhagen on 9 October 1918 to record sound on film, and their system was licensed across Europe and used by American studios in the 1920s.2 From 1945 the company made cutter heads for record makers, and in 1948 it introduced the first moving-coil cartridge.2 Ortofon A/S was founded in 1947; the name comes from the Greek for "correct sound".2 The SPU stereo cartridge followed in 1959, the M-15 moving-magnet cartridge in 1969.2
What to know it by
- SPU1959Stereo moving-coil cartridge
- Concorde1979DJ cartridge
- OM series1981Cartridge with interchangeable styli
- 2M2007Moving-magnet cartridge series
Pictures © Ortofon, from ortofon.com.
Sources
- Ortofon, Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org, read 28 September 2026.
- Our Story, Ortofon. ortofon.com, read 28 September 2026.
Last checked 28 September 2026, against the maker's own pages.