Emotions and nostalgia aside, one has to soberly look at the future of tube gear in context of this event. Over the last 10-15 years, the tastes of the audiophile have shifted toward hard-to-drive speakers like wilson, magico,
This sort of statement seems typical of half the posters on this forum.
They do not know of the incredible solid state amps of 30 years ago … the D’Agostino era Krells for example. Instantaneous power available at 1 Ohm was only limited by the building’s breaker box.
These amps found a market because between Thiels, the assorted large stat panels, and other popular speakers that preceded these amps, the loads were often torturous.
Nevertheless ARC and CJ weren’t displaced by SS. They stayed on as the first love of many. They held their own and remain prized possessions of many audiophiles.
David A. Wilson would have snickered about the idea that Wilson’s were hard to drive. He once did a demo where he laid out crazy big and expensive amps where the audience would assume they were the drivers, and only revealed the much smaller, modest cost amps that were actually driving after the demo had driven the audience into ecstasy.
Wilsons are not hard to drive. Impedance on current models rarely drops below 2.5 Ohms. On the 4 Ohm taps of a good tube amp, this is perfectly reasonable. Most Wilson models run happily on 50 WPC. No you’re not going to fill a ballroom with sound, but it’s more than enough for a typical home installation.
Personal taste is a valid reason to like or not like something. If you’re not afan, that’s fine.
I think a lot of folks will be embarrassed after the new ownership is revealed. That some seem to have a deep seated desire to run ARC and other valve based companies into the ground for the purpose of recreational gossip isn’t surprising… but neither is it useful.
When this is actually over, there will be facts available and a legitimate business case can be developed.
Back in the ‘70s Bill Johnson was told by an engineer that he’d set the industry back 20 years by reintroducing tubes. As tube factories closed in the West, he tried to steer the company to SS, but reviewers would not have it. They loved his tube designs. Bill said he could build a SS amp that sounded as good as a tube amp, but that it’s harder to do, and more expensive.
McIntosh is another example. Gordon Gow thought tubes should be dead, but when he died the amp they built to commemorate his life was a tube amp. Today we see McIntosh hedging their bets with serial and parallel hybrid models that use both tubes and solid state.
If Tubes disappear, it won’t be because people don’t like them anymore. They will have been collateral damage in the foolish political games that plague the world.
my point is that tastes have shifted toward ch, soulution, and the like, and the tube companies have gotten smaller and more artisinal. 
