Club $ 40,000 and a business built on the sale of open-source hardware
This is not a translation, this is a topic based on news .
I already wrote a post about these guys from Colorado. Today they published the news. The news is rather bleak, but I think when the chickens are counted in the fall, it turns out that it is still positive. The fact is that they screwed up pretty big ...
Sparkfun produces MicroView devices - a kickstarter campaign collected over half a million dollars in spring. They make them in batches of 128 pieces, in the process of production they released a new version of the firmware, collected it, drove all the tests, and quietly began to sew all new devices with a new version and send to customers. Everything is wonderful, but at some point it turned out that when trying to update the firmware on the device, the programmer freezes and says that he does not see the device. It quickly became clear that they forgot to sew a bootloader into the firmware, and since they do not use it themselves (sewing through the bootloader is a very long pleasure even in small lots), no one noticed. If you have a SPI programmer, yes or just Arduino, the error is corrected in 10 minutes.
So far they are trying to figure out how many devices they sent without a bootloader, but according to preliminary estimates it turns out that there are 1934 devices. With the cost of the device at $ 30 and taking into account the delivery to any part of the planet - it turns out that the company lost $ 58.020. Wait, wait, how is it lost? But the bootloader is sewn in ten minutes with minimal skills with the Arduino?!?!
')
But delche is interesting. Sparkfan is a company that makes money by selling open-source hardware. Those. for any of their products, you can download all schemes, estimates, sketches, etc. on their website and make the same product yourself. The Chinese copy everything instantly - it takes only 12 weeks from the release of the new product until the appearance of the same products on ebay and aliexpress. And Sparkfan survives due to the constant influx of new products and the highest customer service (ie, instant ordering and support). And here Sparkfan believes that even a step-by-step tutorial explaining to people working with Arduino how to restore a bootloader in this very dune is not a good service. That is why the company will send all those who were sent a defective device, exactly the same, completely free, and apologize for the fact that it will take up to three months. And they highly recommend that everyone try to reflash the device they have already received. Those who succeed in this — well done, and the second, in any case, the distple sent to them, is asked to be treated as compensation for the inconvenience.
Words of gratitude and numerous questions appeared in the comments - why Sparkfan does just that, but, for example, does not recall the entire batch (after all, all devices can be reflashed and re-sold!) Or why they simply will not send people a programmer, etc. The company's answers are very interesting (just collect interesting comments from the staff):
Interesting mamatika, is not it? So you read it, and once again you wonder and wonder about the universal injustice - it seems you need to invest more work in iron, and it is much more difficult to correct the error, and, judging by everything, it is not easy to make ends meet.
What was there in the title of something about the club $ 40,000? And that they have such a club, where anyone who's crap pulls at a loss in the region of $ 40t is automatically credited :-). And at least two of them in the club were noted, and other employees unsubscribed who screwed up and how (for example, I slammed on the first working day, I don’t know how, the grocery page). I can recall the cleaning schedule in our circle, where someone Roma was there - the reasons for which he was cleaned for weeks of cleaning, it was impossible to read without tears: he set fire to the dumpster, lit up a lathe, washed pants in acetone, etc.
And finally, I will add that the company’s founder is a very active member of the open-source community, a member of the open-source hardware association (OSHWA). Those who speak English should listen to his speech at the US Congress on the protection of intellectual property. The post is available here , and the recording of the performance is here (from 43 minutes). Tezisno - the company is 11 years old, he started it in college, now it employs 150 people, an annual turnover of 28 million dollars, all documentation is available on the site, 12 weeks after the release of the new product, cheaper clones are on sale, the company does not deal with any protection intellectual property, strategy - the constant release of new products. A year ago, they produced seventy thousand units a week, in their catalog more than 450 different products, and in just ten years they developed and produced more than seven hundred products. Nat says, I have no time to wait for a patent. The patent only distracts us from the main strategic task - constant innovation. It makes no sense to stop the pirates - show me any anti-piracy technology and I will show you dozens of fifteen-year-old children who will break it without thinking. Better quality and better support - this is how we sell products. In this business model, there is nothing new at all. In addition, more than half of our profits come from abroad. Imagine what it means to try to prosecute patent violators in more than a hundred countries! For example, Nat shows their product - Fio (Good thing, by the way! With charging for lipoli and connector for XBee). After a couple of months, the product was copied by the Chinese, and not just copied, but significantly improved. Instead of fighting on the floor in hysterics, the guys took the Chinese experience and released their new version. The Chinese no longer sell Fio, and Sparkfan still does. As a businessman, Nat says, I can tell Congress that you can hardly do anything worse for us than to tighten the laws relating to the protection of intellectual property. Instead, he proposes to protect small companies from the attacks of large corporations, and to change the term of protection provided by the patent so that this period better reflects the speed of technological evolution (from 20 to 5 years).
Today’s news from Sparkfan, in my opinion, best illustrates the approach described in the presentation.
I already wrote a post about these guys from Colorado. Today they published the news. The news is rather bleak, but I think when the chickens are counted in the fall, it turns out that it is still positive. The fact is that they screwed up pretty big ...
Sparkfun produces MicroView devices - a kickstarter campaign collected over half a million dollars in spring. They make them in batches of 128 pieces, in the process of production they released a new version of the firmware, collected it, drove all the tests, and quietly began to sew all new devices with a new version and send to customers. Everything is wonderful, but at some point it turned out that when trying to update the firmware on the device, the programmer freezes and says that he does not see the device. It quickly became clear that they forgot to sew a bootloader into the firmware, and since they do not use it themselves (sewing through the bootloader is a very long pleasure even in small lots), no one noticed. If you have a SPI programmer, yes or just Arduino, the error is corrected in 10 minutes.
So far they are trying to figure out how many devices they sent without a bootloader, but according to preliminary estimates it turns out that there are 1934 devices. With the cost of the device at $ 30 and taking into account the delivery to any part of the planet - it turns out that the company lost $ 58.020. Wait, wait, how is it lost? But the bootloader is sewn in ten minutes with minimal skills with the Arduino?!?!
')
But delche is interesting. Sparkfan is a company that makes money by selling open-source hardware. Those. for any of their products, you can download all schemes, estimates, sketches, etc. on their website and make the same product yourself. The Chinese copy everything instantly - it takes only 12 weeks from the release of the new product until the appearance of the same products on ebay and aliexpress. And Sparkfan survives due to the constant influx of new products and the highest customer service (ie, instant ordering and support). And here Sparkfan believes that even a step-by-step tutorial explaining to people working with Arduino how to restore a bootloader in this very dune is not a good service. That is why the company will send all those who were sent a defective device, exactly the same, completely free, and apologize for the fact that it will take up to three months. And they highly recommend that everyone try to reflash the device they have already received. Those who succeed in this — well done, and the second, in any case, the distple sent to them, is asked to be treated as compensation for the inconvenience.
Words of gratitude and numerous questions appeared in the comments - why Sparkfan does just that, but, for example, does not recall the entire batch (after all, all devices can be reflashed and re-sold!) Or why they simply will not send people a programmer, etc. The company's answers are very interesting (just collect interesting comments from the staff):
- Perhaps send a programmer easier. But we do not want to force our customers to correct what we have broken. Too many of them do not know how to fix it and they just need a working module. The problem is that all orders were made through Kickstarter and therefore we do not have much information about them.
- We urge everyone to try to flash the bootloader on their own. And we do not need to send anything back - in any case, we will send you a second module.
- On the question of recall: You will be surprised how much the delivery costs. It’s still nothing to send from us, but buying returnable stickers is really expensive. Plus, do not forget that you have to pay to people who will receive these parcels and work with them, keep records - who sent the module back and who did not.
- And another thing: besides the fact that payment of a return is an additional cost, delivery to some parts of the world is also more expensive than the module itself. In addition, it will take at least a year to get all the modules back. And so, we will make a new batch and, I hope, we will correct our mistake for each customer in much less time.
Interesting mamatika, is not it? So you read it, and once again you wonder and wonder about the universal injustice - it seems you need to invest more work in iron, and it is much more difficult to correct the error, and, judging by everything, it is not easy to make ends meet.
What was there in the title of something about the club $ 40,000? And that they have such a club, where anyone who's crap pulls at a loss in the region of $ 40t is automatically credited :-). And at least two of them in the club were noted, and other employees unsubscribed who screwed up and how (for example, I slammed on the first working day, I don’t know how, the grocery page). I can recall the cleaning schedule in our circle, where someone Roma was there - the reasons for which he was cleaned for weeks of cleaning, it was impossible to read without tears: he set fire to the dumpster, lit up a lathe, washed pants in acetone, etc.
And finally, I will add that the company’s founder is a very active member of the open-source community, a member of the open-source hardware association (OSHWA). Those who speak English should listen to his speech at the US Congress on the protection of intellectual property. The post is available here , and the recording of the performance is here (from 43 minutes). Tezisno - the company is 11 years old, he started it in college, now it employs 150 people, an annual turnover of 28 million dollars, all documentation is available on the site, 12 weeks after the release of the new product, cheaper clones are on sale, the company does not deal with any protection intellectual property, strategy - the constant release of new products. A year ago, they produced seventy thousand units a week, in their catalog more than 450 different products, and in just ten years they developed and produced more than seven hundred products. Nat says, I have no time to wait for a patent. The patent only distracts us from the main strategic task - constant innovation. It makes no sense to stop the pirates - show me any anti-piracy technology and I will show you dozens of fifteen-year-old children who will break it without thinking. Better quality and better support - this is how we sell products. In this business model, there is nothing new at all. In addition, more than half of our profits come from abroad. Imagine what it means to try to prosecute patent violators in more than a hundred countries! For example, Nat shows their product - Fio (Good thing, by the way! With charging for lipoli and connector for XBee). After a couple of months, the product was copied by the Chinese, and not just copied, but significantly improved. Instead of fighting on the floor in hysterics, the guys took the Chinese experience and released their new version. The Chinese no longer sell Fio, and Sparkfan still does. As a businessman, Nat says, I can tell Congress that you can hardly do anything worse for us than to tighten the laws relating to the protection of intellectual property. Instead, he proposes to protect small companies from the attacks of large corporations, and to change the term of protection provided by the patent so that this period better reflects the speed of technological evolution (from 20 to 5 years).
Today’s news from Sparkfan, in my opinion, best illustrates the approach described in the presentation.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/234091/
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