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What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

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Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#51

Post by hga »

orionblastar wrote: post #2

The Osborne effect whee announcing a future product before it is made way too early cancels sales of the current project. People forget when Osborne was losing sales, the IBM PC and PC-DOS was gaining sales and CP/M systems like those made by Osborne had a lot of competition. Microsoft/IBM had a converter program that could convert CP/M-80 programs to DOS programs. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2015/04/…

Furthermore, Osborne himself in a front page Wall Street Journal article and/or interview admitted he lied about the cause of the company's demise. This section from Wikipedia casts further doubt on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osborne_effect#The_Osborne_Myt... and I should really get around to working with someone with a Nexis account to properly source that article.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#52

Post by iammaxus »

The author is somehow making a connection between what "doomed" Makerbot and why they went closed source. Makerbot biggest growth year was 2013 (approximately quadrupled booking rate over the course of it), the year immediately after going closed source.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#53

Post by fnordfnordfnord »

fit2rule wrote: post #45
xenadu02 wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does that say about the idea of doing open hardware in general? You do all the work, some other manufacturer in China greatly undercuts you. How is that a good idea?

This is a natural consequence of having contributed to a society where China does all the work, anyway. Either beat China at the manufacturing game, or continually be side-swiped by Chinese manufacturers. Alas, no amount of open source anything is going to assist with that challenge ..

Don't try to beat China at manufacturing. That's a fool's errand for nearly everyone. Let them make most of the things. Concentrate on quality and whatever your core business is.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#54

Post by pmorici »

This leaves out some really important background. Makerbot quietly sold out to Stratasys in 2013. When they did that they lost their soul and their independence. The first sign of that was when they went closed source alienating a huge portion of their customer base. This is just another shoe dropping now that Stratasys owns them they are moving to more tightly integrate Makerbot into the rest of the company. These layoffs are supposedly to remove duplicative positions due to the buyout. There is a good documentary on Netflix about the 3d printing revolution called "Print the Legend" It covers a lot of the history behind Makerbot including the fact that there were really 3 co-founders instead of just the one that gets regularly mentioned in news coverage.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#55

Post by msabalau »

argonaut wrote: post #20

Gee, thanks, Bre. Again, why do you think that's true? How did you come to that conclusion? What do you know that those of us still in the "fantasy world" don't know? Aha, that's it! MakerBot fell victim to the Osborne effect, where talking openly about future products hurt the sale of their current products. Sales dropped, so they got scared and went closed. That sounds like a way more honest and real answer than th…

The author may have a dog in this fight, but it would be incorrect to claim they have a beef with MakerBot's founders, given that Zach “Hoeken” Smith, one of the founders, has been openly critical of the move to closed source, and also was forced out of the company.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#56

Post by makomk »

FreakyT wrote: post #48
ChuckMcM wrote: post #17

The challenge of being an open source hardware manufacturer in the presence of an economy that is better suited to create hardware than you are (China in this case) is that you really have to execute well. I agree it was a huge mistake on Bre's part to leak the upcoming Rep 2. Without incoming orders you have to fund current orders and R&D out of cash on hand, and that doesn't work without a big line of credit. But i…

> I am convinced that their lack of openness lead directly to the C.F. that is their "SmartStruder" which now has people calling for class action lawsuits. What is the story of this? (I tried searching for "SmartStruder class action" and all I found was this particular comment.)

It's actually called the Smart Extruder, you should find more results if you search for that. Rumour has it they knew they were dodgy, shipped them anyway, and then quietly redesigned them a few months later: http://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/2ovd27/makerbot_...

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#57

Post by jkestner »

FreakyT wrote: post #48
ChuckMcM wrote: post #17

The challenge of being an open source hardware manufacturer in the presence of an economy that is better suited to create hardware than you are (China in this case) is that you really have to execute well. I agree it was a huge mistake on Bre's part to leak the upcoming Rep 2. Without incoming orders you have to fund current orders and R&D out of cash on hand, and that doesn't work without a big line of credit. But i…

> I am convinced that their lack of openness lead directly to the C.F. that is their "SmartStruder" which now has people calling for class action lawsuits. What is the story of this? (I tried searching for "SmartStruder class action" and all I found was this particular comment.)

Only "calling for class action lawsuits", in the way that enthusiasts spurned do.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#58

Post by kreitje »

hugs wrote: post #5
jacknews wrote: post #4

To avoid the Osborne effect, they could simply have produced new versions and only open the source once released. That's not the real problem. I guess it was a combination of chinese knockoffs and stratasys proprietary instincts. In any case, IMHO, the layoffs are a result of losing the open community, which is now being serviced by true open-source proponents like Aleph with their excellent Lulzbot printers.

Yup, I only buy LulzBot printers (I own 3 now), pretty much a direct result of MakerBot's decision to go closed.

If you are around northern Colorado, they give tours of their place.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#59

Post by jkestner »

jjwiseman wrote: post #19

I'm curious to see how 3D Robotics handles a similar situation. Their drone platform has been open source hardware plus open source software. There are Chinese companies cloning the hardware and selling it for much cheaper than 3D Robotics sells it for. 3D Robotics just raised $50M in a series C. It will be interesting to see how their commitment to openness holds up.

Agreed that it will be an interesting study. 3DR needs to cross the chasm into mass acceptance before their cost-conscious hobbyist base migrates. (Consider this in the light of Anderson's comparisons to the Apple II.) As others pointed out, MakerBot's tech couldn't make the leap, and 3D printing doesn't have a mass market on the horizon.

If 3DR drones are more expensive, it's not only because they're not made in China. Manufacturing in Mexico is cheap enough, and buys you lead time, which suits their extremely fast iteration. A good idea in this gold rush.

People will pay more for the brand, if it stands for great support and integration. China is traditionally poor at those. 3DR started with a community, and regular people diving into drones will appreciate this comfort level.

TL;DR: To fight cheaper, make it better.

Re: What doomed MakerBot? The Osborne effect

#60

Post by jkestner »

hyperpallium wrote: post #14
orionblastar wrote: post #2

The Osborne effect whee announcing a future product before it is made way too early cancels sales of the current project. People forget when Osborne was losing sales, the IBM PC and PC-DOS was gaining sales and CP/M systems like those made by Osborne had a lot of competition. Microsoft/IBM had a converter program that could convert CP/M-80 programs to DOS programs. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2015/04/…

And Osbourne probably preannounced so early because of the competition (to pre-empt users switching). Preannouncement and failure were correlated due to a common cause. OTOH MS vapourware has scuttled competitors. So it depends on your market power. Osbourne was against IBM and a disruptive tide.

Right - it was a move of desperation. Perhaps Osbourne could've marketed/distributed their way out. But it's hard to position yourself as the brand that no one gets fired for buying when someone's already got that spot.

With MakerBot, another issue may be that the market is approaching saturation. As they're being eaten by cheaper competitors, they haven't been able to create a new market to grow into. I suppose the Replicator is an attempt to do that - how has that done?

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