Located in Kenilworth in the English midlands, j-Omega Electronics was founded in 1996 and is now a major supplier of MIDI-to-parallel interface systems worldwide.

The Owner

The business was started and continues to be managed by the sole owner/proprietor, Dr John Wale.

Dr J D Wale

John has been interested in music and electronics for as long as he can remember and started putting this interest in practice at the age of eight when he began to learn both soldering and playing the violin (although not both at the same time!).

At the age of sixteen, John built a 25-note mechanical pipe organ with a pneumatic keyframe for cardboard book music. Finding the cost of music books too much for his income at that time, he set about designing and building an electronic interface for the organ so it could be played by his 1970's Commodore PET computer. This worked well, but the computer plus its disk drives was large and almost as heavy as the organ! When MIDI started to become prevalent and floppy-disk sequencers became affordable, John re-designed the computer's organ interface to become a stand-alone circuit board with its own processor and a MIDI interface. As a result of discussions with early internet newsgroup users, it became apparent that other organ builders might have a use for a similar circuit so j-Omega Electronics was formed and this circuit became the MTP-1: the company's first MIDI-to-parallel product.

Since that time, John has gone on to gain a PhD from the University of Warwick, UK, in electronic engineering with a specialism in embedded microprocessor systems and motion controls. He now divides his working time between product development, day-to-day management of j-Omega Electronics and acting as a product design consultant for various electronics companies, both in the UK and abroad.

Production

All j-Omega products are built in, tested in and despatched from the UK, but use components sourced from many parts of the world. Extensive use is made of information technology, allowing most orders to be fulfilled without requiring the customer to do any more than provide order details on the website.

Automated programming and testing of an MTP-7 circuit

We have a policy of continual product and service improvement and, to that end, are working on new automation systems to reduce order processing times and also to improve the information provided to customers whilst they await delivery of their goods. New product designs are also being worked on, based on what customers tell us they would like to have. We always welcome suggestions for new product ideas which can be sent using the Contact page.

Although our computer-based automation can carry out the order process with minimal personal intervention, we understand that customers may need to ask questions before or after placing an order and so expert advice is always available. We aim to respond to any messages placed on the Contact page within 48 hours.

Services

Having invested heavily in product design, process automation and internet marketing, j-Omega Electronics is now ideally placed to offer these types of services under contract to other companies or individuals. We can offer the following:

• Customisation of j-Omega products to client specifications
• Electronic product design, particularly MIDI and/or motion control applications
• 2D and 3D CAD design of custom mechanical parts
• PC-based automatic test equipment design and fabrication
• 32-bit Windows GUI application development with emphasis on hardware interaction
• HTML, Perl CGI and SQL coding for interactive websites
• Component sourcing, particularly PCBs, electronic and electro-mechanical components
• Prototype and small batch through-hole PCB assembly

Some examples of the above activities can be seen on the Application Examples page.
Please use the Contact page to enquire about any of these services.