Sonos UK

The UK arm of Sonos, the wireless home-audio company, with a registered office in London and Europe's first Sonos store in Seven Dials.

About Sonos UK

Sonos makes wireless speakers, soundbars and headphones that fill a home with music from a phone. Its products include the Arc and Beam soundbars, the Era 100 and Era 300 speakers, and the Ace headphones. It also runs Sonos Radio, an internet radio service. The company calls itself 'a sound experience company' and says it invented multiroom wireless audio in 2005, meaning one system that plays in many rooms at once. Sonos has sold into the UK since mid-2005.

Sonos began in August 2002 as Rincon Audio, started by John MacFarlane, Craig Shelburne, Tom Cullen and Trung Mai in Santa Barbara, California, and took its present name in 2004. A 2011 What Hi-Fi? article said the company aims to 'play all the music on earth'. In the same article MacFarlane said, 'If we can't make an outrageously good product, we won't make it', and the firm described itself as 'a company created by music lovers, for music lovers'. More recently Sonos says its goal is to help people around the world listen better. These are the company's own statements.

In the UK, Companies House lists Sonos Atlantic Limited (company number 06173852, incorporated in March 2007) with a registered office at One London Wall, London EC2Y 5EB; a search listing showed the same number under the name Sonos UK Limited. In December 2017 Sonos opened its first European concept store at 21 to 23 Earlham Street in Seven Dials, central London, with two house-shaped listening rooms decorated by the artists Camille Walala and Neil Raitt. Its London job listings have included an Amazon marketing lead for the EMEA region (Europe, Middle East and Africa) and a senior commercial finance analyst, which shows that the London team works on sales, marketing and finance.

Built In London describes a team 'united by a culture of respect, transparency, collaboration and ownership' and gives about 1,800 employees in total, though a reference entry gives 1,404 for 2025, so the figure is not consistent. At the store opening, general store manager Whitney Walker said the aim was to create 'a really comfortable and inspiring environment'. Rob Lambourne, who led user experience for hardware and software, is British and had worked at Philips before joining. Sonos designs its products in-house and, as at 2011, had them made in China.

Jobs in the UK are therefore mainly in marketing, partnerships, finance, sales, retail and customer experience, with the product engineering done in other parts of the company. If you like music and want to work on how technology reaches ordinary households, it is a useful example. Check the Sonos careers site for roles based in London, and ask which are in the store and which in the office.

What they do

• {'desc': 'Arc, Beam and Era speakers that link across rooms.', 'title': 'Wireless speakers and soundbars'}
• {'desc': 'Ace wireless headphones.', 'title': 'Headphones'}
• {'desc': 'An internet radio service and the app that controls the system.', 'title': 'Sonos Radio and app'}

Key facts

• Founded August 2002 as Rincon Audio; renamed Sonos in 2004
• Sold in the UK from mid-2005
• First European concept store opened at 21 to 23 Earlham Street, Seven Dials, in December 2017
• Registered office: One London Wall, London EC2Y 5EB

Website: www.sonos.com/en-gb