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Originally Posted by kacir
It was useful and very interesting.
An insight to the process of how generic device is being born is something that an outsider as myself can only very rarely see.
I see why some people do not understand how it is possible that *Your* factory refuses to make device that *you* ask them to. Such is the economic reality. Bean counters step in and say, "OK. If you really, *really* want us to do this, put $XY,000,000 in escrow to cover our loses this will cause at the end of the fiscal year." Because even if factory is yours, their highest responsibility is still producing profit. Enough money to pay for workers, material, [thousands of other things] and, preferably, some money for the owner or for expansion of facility.
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Dear Kacir:
What happens is that any factory in Asia has the ability to sell devices they build in Asia, Russia, etc. It so happens that in Russia, for example, there is a huge demand for ANY eBook Reader but little competition. So... they get orders for 10,000 or 20,000 at a shot. They don't want changes... just build them. Then we step in and say: "let us have an order of 1,000 units and make a ton of changes". That is essentially the problem. The factory, like you said, has a profit motive. We, despite part ownership, are not a big profit for them... but a nightmare of questions and changes and lack of speaking the language fluently.
We are learning to make things work and they are trying too.... but, for them, it is hard to imagine that North America has such fearsome competition and such a market that can be particular. That is what we are up against.
When someone in Russia wants particular units they do an NRE fee of $10,000-$50,000 paid up front. We are trying to get changes without the NRE fee so we keep our price to the end user down. This is what is hard to explain... it is not management... it is culture. They do not face Amazon and Sony there... and we do. They cannot imagine it.
Anyway, thank you for your post and your comments!!