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Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

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Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#101

Post by boomfunky »

dpflan wrote: post #89
jacquesm wrote: post #4

On the one hand I'm happy they're doing well. On the other I'm very much worried that floating the stock will make it plaything of people who couldn't care less about what the Raspberry Pi and the people behind it stand for, they're just going to use the stock to make money, or, alternatively, to make trouble. Being a listed company is a source of all kinds of distractions.

There is no question a public stock becomes a plaything for sophisticated gamblers.

It sure does, but also provides the company with exponentially more room for growth. As it stands they still make fast, tiny, low power computers with a large amount of community and enterprise support. They still make an in-demand product, and aren't finding difficulty in selling them. Investing in IPO's is a real gambler and suckers game to me, but in the long term this could accelerate the growth of the company greatly. Whether that leads to exciting and innovative new products from them is completely in their hands.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#102

Post by mrmanner »

techdragon wrote: post #5
londons_explore wrote: post #3

Wasn't it supposed to be a charity/non profit foundation? Isn't an IPO kinda the opposite of that? Or is is the fashionable thing these days to claim to be non-profit when you're young and looking for grassroots support, only to transform when there is money to be made?

Yeah... I have major concerns about how significantly this would impact their ostensible goals. What guarantee is there that the newly publicly listed company won't be pressured by stockholders to improve the profit margins by driving up prices and reducing product quality on both the hardware and software fronts.

That could end up not too bad actually - the for-profit company becomes hugely profitable, the foundation uses the dividends to further their goals of affordable computer education etc. etc.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#103

Post by arp242 »

botanical wrote: post #57

To me it feels like the Raspberry Pi Foundation hasn't met its objective of making computers accessible and affordable to everyone (especially children in disadvantaged areas). Each iteration is so expensive and previous iterations don't lose value or are made cheaper. It's more prudent to spend a bit more for a mini-pc. In South Africa, the average child from a disadvantaged background has no chance of buying a Pi.…

A rpi was never "useful enough" to really be a replacement for desktop computers, and it was never "cheap enough" for purely a teaching tool. Cheap second-hand laptops were always a better option IMO.

Arduino makes completely different types of computers.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#104

Post by esskay »

arp242 wrote: post #99
esskay wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I say, its fairly hard to demonstrate 'live' as they delete the posts, but if it helps here's a few reports of it, and related activities: - https://community.element14.com/products/raspberry-pi/f/foru... (lots of similar reports of weird bans) - https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/raspberry-pi-forums-banne... (a few people reporting similar cases / reasons for being banned here) - https://forums.raspberrypi.com/vi…

You can find complaints like that for any forum that's been around for a while. You should see what some people are saying about HN for example. I've banned people a as moderator, and some of them have gone on to spread complete falsehoods about this. While I'm not saying there is not a problem or that all accounts are incorrect, I find it very hard to trust these accounts from random anonymous internet people. Espec…

I don't disagree that there are going to be a loud minority who genuinely did deserve a ban, and I did read the links, as I mentioned before though the links were only provided as a 'this is all I can provide short of you trying it yourself' as they tend to delete posts from new users who've been banned for asking a legitimate question. I was in a bit of a lose lose situation by posting.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#105

Post by dpflan »

boomfunky wrote: post #101
dpflan wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no question a public stock becomes a plaything for sophisticated gamblers.

It sure does, but also provides the company with exponentially more room for growth. As it stands they still make fast, tiny, low power computers with a large amount of community and enterprise support. They still make an in-demand product, and aren't finding difficulty in selling them. Investing in IPO's is a real gambler and suckers game to me, but in the long term this could accelerate the growth of the company gr…

The CEO stated an expectation of `<= 2x` growth for the non-profit. The entity has been around for more than a decade, and they need to IPO to 2x...?

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#106

Post by jacquesm »

pathartl wrote: post #78
michaelt wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not convinced "Arduino has kinda dropped the ball" While Arduino is strong in many regards and was a big improvement on the status quo when it came out in ~2005, they weren't very fast to respond to the rise of the esp8266 and super-low-cost boards made in China. For a long time their cheapest product was the Uno R3 (with a 16 MHz 8-bit ATmega328) for about $25 while you could buy a Wemos D1 mini (with a 160 MH…

It's wild to me that they still offer the Mega 2560 Rev3 for nearly $50 with a USB-B port.

The fact that they do is what makes them a safe bet to use. Better expensive and available than unavailable. One the most annoying features of hardware work is that whatever you base your product on tends to disappear in smoke just when you hit production.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#107

Post by jacquesm »

dpflan wrote: post #90
jacquesm wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I'm aware of that. I'm merely wondering whether or not they realize the long term consequences of this move.

Well they say it will "2x" the non-profit side...not sure the time-scale on that... """ it will let Raspberry Pi's not-for-profit side expand by "at least a factor of 2X." """ Plus, full: """ The business arm of Raspberry Pi is preparing to make an initial public offering (IPO) in London. CEO Eben Upton tells Ars that should the IPO happen, it will let Raspberry Pi's not-for-profit side expand by "at least a factor o…

Time will tell. The naivety in that quote is impressive.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#108

Post by KaiserPro »

michaelt wrote: post #63
jacquesm wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget the Micro:bit and I'm not convinced "Arduino has kinda dropped the ball", they are doing just fine in the marketplace and the gear has come down in price to where $4 gets you a working microcontroller (and $5 for the Raspi 2040 pico). What you can get under $10 these days is mindblowing and if all Arduino ever did was make their IDE which ties 100's of different boards together under a common development…

> I'm not convinced "Arduino has kinda dropped the ball" While Arduino is strong in many regards and was a big improvement on the status quo when it came out in ~2005, they weren't very fast to respond to the rise of the esp8266 and super-low-cost boards made in China. For a long time their cheapest product was the Uno R3 (with a 16 MHz 8-bit ATmega328) for about $25 while you could buy a Wemos D1 mini (with a 160 MH…

> big improvement on the status quo when it came out in ~2005,

I agree. If anything its an understatement. I could, as a normal person outside academia, without a structured learning environment, do microcontrollers, affordably. Not only that, I could make amazing things with it.

sure there was the basic stamp, but that was well, basic.

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#109

Post by palata »

alibarber wrote: post #60
palata wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You've got it the wrong way around. I don't see how it is the wrong way around: what you are saying is that they are a for-profit, and depending on how much profit they make with their business, the foundation gets more money to "play with", right?

Well, where else is the foundation supposed to get the money from?

Being a non-profit does not mean that you cannot sell stuff. I think it just means that you cannot make profit for it. So there is no incentive for stakeholders to make you grow infinitely, because they don't get money from that.

At least that would be my understanding with a non-profit?

Re: Raspberry Pi Picks Banks for IPO, Choosing London over New York

#110

Post by ebcode »

aleph_minus_one wrote: post #80
whywhywhywhy wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After Raspberry Pi, OpenAI and Processing Foundation I'll never trust a "non-profit" again

What happened to the Processing Foundation?

See https://discourse.processing.org/t/ben-fry-resigning-from-th...
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