It's too bad Denon (DENki ONkyo) didn't buy this Onkyo to make the merger complete :). I'm guessing it wasn't worth it to go downmarket via Onkyo, and it sounds like Onkyo had been accumulating debt for years.
Onkyo means sound. Also: Often when there’s To (actually Tō) in a company’s name, it refers to Tokyo’s To such as in Toshiba.
You mean it refers to "east"?
Even if To means East - in a compound To often stands for Tokyo.
Same concept in these words:
来日 - Nichi means day, here it stands for Japan.
Here’s an article about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_abbreviated_and_contr...
More examples: Todai (To for Tokyo), Nissan (Ni for Nippon)
But really it's short for The To in Tokyo Electiric, And the Shiba in Shibaura Manufacturing, two companies that were fused together.
source: https://gogen.info/company/electrical-manufacturer/toshiba/
Given all this, I would find "obsolete" a misleading descriptor. For that matter, I'd find "traditional" misleading as well, as that could refer to the native Japanese pronunciation (kun'yomi).
I was however surprised to learn that Denon was actually founded by an American in Japan in 1910.
The market segment for Onkyo just doesn’t exist anymore - those that want receivers and a HiFi/HT setup are already well served Denon/Marantz and Yamaha (and the “audiophile” world beyond that is a pretty well saturated market). Sony is still around but that’s clearly not their core business.
But the former Onkyo base has been eroded by soundbars and wireless multi speaker setups.