His discoveries changed the lives of generations of music fans. Many awards were given on March 12 to Dutch engineer Lou Ottens, who is considered to be the inventor of the audio cassette and co-designer of the CD, after news that he died at the age of 94.
Created by Lou Ottens while working at Dutch electronics giant Philips, the cassette made music bearable for the first time and allowed a generation of music fans to mix their favorite tunes.
Two-sided, yet incredibly easy to play, more than 100 billion tapes were produced worldwide, from the height of the sixties to the eighties. ‘It makes all of us sad about the passing of Lou Ottens, Olga Coolen, director of the Philips Museum in Eindhoven, responded in a press release sent to AFP. Lou is an extraordinary man who loves technology, even though his inventions have humble beginnings. ‘
He died on March 6 in the town of Duizel, near the Belgian border, Philips said. Lou Ottens was born in the town of Bellingwolde in the Netherlands in 1926 and showed an interest in technology from an early age, when the Netherlands was occupied by Nazi Germany during World War II.
He specially built a radio with which he could receive the Oranje ‘free Dutch’ radio station, thanks to the special antenna he used. “German filter” because Nazi pity was avoided, reports the Dutch newspaper NRC.
Lou Ottens joined Philips after studying engineering at the university where he and his team developed the world’s first portable recording device, the company said. But he quickly became frustrated with the extensive coil system, which required manual winding, and he invented the cassette in 1962. “The cassette was created out of annoyance with the existing recording device, it’s that simple.”Lou Ottens, quoted by the NRC, said in an interview.
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