Client: Alan Wolfson
Project: Electonic Design Consultant
Date: 2007 & 2012
Scope: Alan Wolfson creates handmade miniature sculptures of urban environments. Complete with complex interior views and lighting effects. Simon Higgs provided hands-on technical expertise for the exhibiton-grade power supplies for the lighting effects on Peepworld and Katz's Deli.
Client: 65 Amps
Project: Vacuum Tube Guitar Amplifier Consulting
Date: 2010-2012
Scope: 65 Amps are one of the leading boutique guitar amplifier builders. Simon Higgs provided manufacturing consulting for the launch of the London Pro amplifier as well as ongoing refinement of the germanium transistor Colour Boost effects pedal as well as the prototyping of new effects pedal designs.
Client: New York Times (Rothwell, Figg, Ernst & Manbeck, P.C.)
Project: Expert Witness
Date: 2010
Scope: Simon Higgs provided professional services including expert testimony and the discovery of prior art used to resolve patent litigation. The prior art concerned the first use of rotating banner advertisements by Simon Higgs in 1995.
Client: Coupons.com, Inc. (Foley & Lardner LLP)
Project: Expert Witness
Date: 2009-2010
Scope: Simon Higgs provided professional services including expert testimony and the discovery of prior art used to resolve patent litigation. The prior art concerned the first use of downloadable coupons by Simon Higgs in 1994.
Client: News Corporation (Rothwell, Figg, Ernst & Manbeck, P.C.)
Project: Expert Witness
Date: 2009-2010
Scope: Simon Higgs provided professional services including expert testimony and the discovery of prior art used to resolve patent litigation. The prior art concerned the first use of downloadable coupons by Simon Higgs in 1994.
Client: Coupons.com
Project: Original Founder
Date: 1994-2000
Scope: Simon Higgs is the original founder of Coupons.com (under the brand name CouponNet), pioneering the first downloadable coupons in 1994. Two years later, Simon won the CommerceNet '96 Very Innovative Practice Award for Best Online Community for pioneering what is now known as social media to create a disruptive trading forum for printed coupons. Simon sold Coupons.com in 2000, retaining the CouponNet branding.
Client: Zemaitis International
Project: Guitar Consulting / Client Representative
Date: 2008-2009
Scope: Japanese guitar manufacturer Kanda Shokai/Greco have revived the legacy of legendary English luthier Tony Zemaitis. Simon Higgs was honoured to represent them at both the 2008 and 2009 Winter NAMM Shows.
Project: Wattkins Amp Forums
Scope: Guitar Amp Building / Online Community
Date: 2007 - present
Details: Wattkins Amp Forums was founded by members of 18watt.com from "over-spill" discussions surrounding the cheap and easy to modify Epiphone Valve Junior guitar amplifier. Using Simon Higgs' previous award winning online community expertise, he designed a new set of forums to be as inclusive as possible while providing separate discussion areas for the different genres of guitar amplifiers. As a result, a group of discussion forums with common login credentials were created around the "watt" theme under the general name "Wattkins Amp Forums". The following sites are all part of Wattkins Amp Forums:
* ppwatt.com (for push-pull tube amps)
* sewatt.com (for single-ended tube amps)
* 45watt.com (for Marshall JTM-45 & Fender Bassman amps)
* wattkins.com (a place for the amp building community to hang out)
Client: Lipe Guitars USA
Project: Guitar Consulting / Client Representative
Date: 2007-2012
Scope: Michael Lipe was the Master Luthier at Ibanez's artist custom shop in Hollywood, California and hand-built the guitars played by primary endorsers Steve Vai, Joe Satriani and many others. Now he's building guitars under his own name. Simon Higgs provides management & marketing expertise including the creation of display ads that were published in Vintage Guitar magazine. He also represented Lipe Guitars at both the 2008 and 2009 Winter NAMM Shows.
Client: Monster Guitars
Project: Guitar Consulting
Date: 2007-2011
Scope: We provided IT support, Internet and marketing services. We also created a number of display ads for Monster Guitar that were published in Vintage Guitar magazine.
Client: TogaMan Guitars
Project: Guitar Consulting
Date: 2006-2009
Scope: Togaman have refined the electric guitar so each string can be bowed using an ordinary violin bow and have been awarded a US patent defining a new instrument as a result. Now Hollywood's composers use Togaman guitars as their secret weapon in blockbuster scores, turning up in the sound tracks of movies from Curous George to 300 as well as TV shows such as CSI Miami. Simon Higgs has provided internet, marketing and management consulting including the creation of display ads that were published in Vintage Guitar magazine.
Client: N*Soul Records
Project: Music Distribution
Date: 2006-
Scope: They describe themselves as "the largest Christian Dance record label on the planet" with releases such as the Nitro Praise series and remixes of Larry Norman. We provide the digital distribution in online stores such as the iTunes Music Store.
Client: Vineyard Music Himalayas
Project: "Thirst"
Date: 2004
Scope: The songs were recorded in a studio in Kathmandu, Nepal and sent over to us for mixing and mastering. Because of the difference in available recording technology, some audio restoration and cleaning was required before the project could be mixed. This was done with a Pro Tools-based system using various noise reduction, compression & EQ plug-ins. The project was mixed and mastered by Simon Higgs and Boris Menart.
Client: Platform Records
Project: "The Cosmic Storyteller"
Date: 1997-2001
Scope: The Cosmic Storyteller master tapes were were in pitiful shape. The first step was the transfer of all the tapes to a digital medium. The tapes were in fact worked on in several studios where the ADAT format made it possible to take them back and forth between Macintosh and PC platforms. Some of the original master tapes were on four-track masters on which elements were sub-mixed, but most of the songs were originally done on an eight-track Ampex recorder. On these multi-track tapes, we had the luxury of being able to clean up a lot of problems before actually mixing and mastering.
Client: Universal Systems Inc. / Integic Corporation (now aquired by Northrop Grumman)
Project: Document Management Consulting
Date: 1997-2000
Scope: Hired for a DoD web project on the west coast, we found ourselves working hard to eliminate fat-clients on the desktop. In doing so, we successfully obseleted our client's existing core business software. Fortunately, they came back to us for more abuse and we helped them position themselves as the prime contractor on a number of other DoD web-related projects.
Client: U.S. Department of Defense
Project: Composite Health Care System II (CHCS II)
Date: 1998
Scope: DoD's premier health care system, Composite Health Care System II (CHCS II) is the first (military or civilian) cradle-to-grave automated health care record, one that can revolutionize the effectiveness of the Military Health System by providing instantaneous patient information to health care providers worldwide. CHCS II is on the leading edge of technology and links multiple commercial-off-the-shelf products together, both within and among nearly 170 military treatment facilities worldwide, in a way that is not being done or even necessary in the civilian sector.
As a sub-contractor, Higgs Communications created the first demonstration model of Release 1 which Pentagon upper management used to evaluate and approve program funding. CHCS II is now called the Armed Forces Health Longitudinal Technology Application (AHLTA).
Client: U.S. Department of Defense
Project: e-Commerce Contract Management Program
Date: 1997-2000
Scope: Starting under the Defense Logistics Agency's (DLA) Defense Contract Management Command (DCMC), the project culminated in the creation of the Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA) in early 2000. Web and internet architecture, network design, and graphic design services were provided to the Information Technology and Public Affairs departments.
Client: Sonic Images Records / Christopher Franke
Project: Sonic Images Web / eCommerce Site / Distribution
Date: 1995 & 2007-
Scope: For the April 11, 1995 launch of the Babylon 5 TV show soundtrack CD, Higgs Communications was commissioned to design and create the Sonic Images Records web site and shopping cart. Deciding to host their site in-house, this also involved creating their networking infrastructure as well as editing audio clips for online distribution using Pro Tools. Sonic Images Records is owned by Christopher Franke (ex-Tangerine Dream) who composed the Babylon 5 sountrack.
Client: Marshall Industries
Project: Marshall Industries / eCommerce Site
Date: 1994
Scope: Electronics distributor Marshall Industries started on e-commerce before the word even existed. The company began investigating direct Internet-based connections to its suppliers in 1993, and Higgs Communications built its first web based-system which was launched in July 1994. In the next five years, electronic supply chain initiatives helped grow Marshall Industries from $500 million to $2 billion. Marshall Industries was acquired by Avnet, one of their major competitors, in 1999.
Client: Electronic Cafe International
Project: Electronic Cafe Showcase @ Viacom
Date: 1993
Scope: Higgs Communications has worked on a number of projects for the Electronic Cafe providing Telecommunications and Internet expertise. Please check out the case study of the ECI Showcase @ Viacom Interactive TV event.
Client: Pantheon Productions
Project: Charlton Heston Voyage Through The Bible (CD-ROM)
Date: 1993
Scope: Video & sound editing for the New Testament portion of this project. The original footage from the PBS television series was captured by a Radius Telecast i/o box, where it was edited on an Apple Macintosh using Adobe Premiere. Equilibrium's Debabelizer was then used to optimize the video to match the 256-color pallettes of the background stills. The audio was edited with Deck II and the final optimization and sample rate reduction was done using Digidesign's Sound Designer.
Client: Gibson Guitar Corp.
Project: Artist Relations Consultant
Date: 1990-1992
Scope: Originally hired as an intern to maintain the Artist Relations guitar collection while studying at Musician's Institute's GIT, Simon Higgs was hired as an Artist Relations consultant immediately upon graduating.
He worked as a liason between Gibson's West Coast Custom Shop, Gibson Labs, and the Artist Relations department. Please check out the case study of the original Jimmy Page Signature Les Paul built by Roger Giffin.