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HamsterRage · 11-02-2010, 10:09 AM

Personally, I think the Kobo people were totally caught be surprise at their own success. I truly doubt that they expected that what they've done would change the landscape of the ereader market so dramatically, or so soon.

My guess is that their business plan had them sticking with the Gen1 device through Christmas this year, and that the $149 price would still be the lowest on the market by a long shot. Price slashing by Sony and Kindle sent that business plan to the shredder before summer even started.

I'd bet that getting a WiFi device out on the market became a matter of survival for them. The only other choice would be to drop the price of the original unit below $100. So by adding a $9 part to the reader, they've been able to keep the price $50 higher. That's quite possibly the difference between sinking or thriving.

This is all conjecture, but my guess is that they probably promised all of the "extras", and the new firmware updates honestly expecting to be able to deliver them. But given a choice between sticking with those promises and going under, or putting all the resources they've got into getting a new, competitive product on the market ASAP they made the pragmatic, sensible choice.

So am I happy about it? Obviously not. But I think I can understand what happened, and I really doubt that they've forgotten about us. I wouldn't have minded seeing a mea culpa about it here though. Maybe in a thread like this????

11-02-2010, 10:09 AM	#60
HamsterRage Evangelist Posts: 435 Karma: 24326 Join Date: Jun 2010 Device: Kobo	Personally, I think the Kobo people were totally caught be surprise at their own success. I truly doubt that they expected that what they've done would change the landscape of the ereader market so dramatically, or so soon. My guess is that their business plan had them sticking with the Gen1 device through Christmas this year, and that the $149 price would still be the lowest on the market by a long shot. Price slashing by Sony and Kindle sent that business plan to the shredder before summer even started. I'd bet that getting a WiFi device out on the market became a matter of survival for them. The only other choice would be to drop the price of the original unit below $100. So by adding a $9 part to the reader, they've been able to keep the price $50 higher. That's quite possibly the difference between sinking or thriving. This is all conjecture, but my guess is that they probably promised all of the "extras", and the new firmware updates honestly expecting to be able to deliver them. But given a choice between sticking with those promises and going under, or putting all the resources they've got into getting a new, competitive product on the market ASAP they made the pragmatic, sensible choice. So am I happy about it? Obviously not. But I think I can understand what happened, and I really doubt that they've forgotten about us. I wouldn't have minded seeing a mea culpa about it here though. Maybe in a thread like this????