I believe it may also be a matter of philosophy.

The smaller companies such as Outlaw are thinking quality first and are targeting the audio and videophile who are seeking better performance and higher quality products and components. I don't know if they are thinking number of units sold first and foremost but obviously they must take that into consideration before they invest. Companies such as Marantz and Denon do a lot of research with respect to features that are going to sell to the mass consumer and they also have a price point that they are determined to meet. If you look at the price levels, you will see $499, $699, $999, $1100, $1400 and this repeats every year with their new models. The models change, the features change some what but the price points fall in line.

So yes I think that Outlaw can put together a team as you stated and maybe at advantage because with Outlaw there may not be the restraint of price point. Think of what Yamaha, Denon and Marantz could do if corporate told the engineers to build the best units possible with today's technology and whatever it cost...it cost.

Today's TV's are also a good example. If you follow the reviews and test you will see that the last couple of years there have not been significant advancement in black levels, color uniformity, filtering, gamma accuracy, etc. but they do almost everything a desktop computer can do and evidently that's what the people want.