Roberto del Rosario

Roberto Legaspi del Rosario (June 7, 1919 – July 30, 2003) was a Filipino entrepreneur; best known as the patentholder of the Sing-Along System, a type of karaoke appliance he developed in 1975. From his entrepreneurial initiative to patent a karaoke system first, he frequently, albeit arguably, became referred to as "the inventor of Karaoke".

Patent rights to karaoke
Del Rosario held the patent to the Sing-along System, a type of karaoke he developed in 1975, and was consequently recognized as the sole patent holder of the karaoke system worldwide. He filed a patent infringement case against a Chinese company before the Philippine Supreme Court. In 1996, the court ruled that the Chinese company violated his patent rights. Despite this, a book entitled Karaoke Idols: Popular Music and the Performance of Identity credits Daisuke Inoue, a Japanese man, as having invented karaoke earlier in 1971.