Sennheiser electronic GmbH & Co. KG (/?z?nha?z?r/, German pronunciation: [z?n?ha??z?]) is a German privately held audio company specializing in the design and production of a wide range of high fidelity products, including microphones, headphones, telephone accessories and aviation headsets for personal, professional and business applications. The company\'s head office is located in Wedemark, near Hanover, and the company is represented in more than 50 countries worldwide.[2] The German company was founded in 1945 by Fritz Sennheiser and it is still an independent family business. Since 2013, Daniel Sennheiser and Andreas Sennheiser have been co-CEOs. They are the third generation of the Sennheiser family to lead the company. According to its own figures, the Sennheiser Group has around 2,801 employees worldwide. In 2019, the total turnover amounted to ?756.7 million. The company was founded in 1945, just a few weeks after the end of World War II by Fritz Sennheiser (1912?2010)[3][4] and seven fellow engineers of the University of Hannover in a laboratory called Laboratorium Wennebostel (shortened, \"Labor W\"). The laboratory was named after the village of Wennebostel in the municipality of Wedemark to where it had been moved due to the war. Its first product was a voltmeter.[5] Lab W began building microphones in 1946 with the DM1, and began developing them in 1947 with the DM2. By 1955, the company had 250 employees, and had begun production of many products including geophysical equipment, the Noise-Compensated microphone (DM4), microphone transformers, mixers, and miniature magnetic headphones. Labor W was renamed \'Sennheiser electronic\' in 1958.[6] In the late 1950s/early 1960s, Sennheiser met Thomas Schillinger. Schillinger was tasked with starting Sennheiser\'s presence in the United States. Sennheiser was transformed into a limited partnership (KG) in 1973. In 1980, the company entered the aviation market, supplying Lufthansa with headsets.[7][8] The company began producing modern wireless microphones in 1982, the same year when founder Fritz Sennheiser handed the management of the company over to his son, J?rg Sennheiser. In 1987, Sennheiser was awarded at the 59th Academy Awards for its MKH 816 shotgun microphone. Also in 1991, Georg Neumann GmbH, Berlin, which builds studio microphones, became a part of Sennheiser.[9][10]