Originally shared by Nils Hitze
TakerBot
http://hackaday.com/2016/04/28/the-makerbot-obituary/
I figured they were on the way out the other day when they release that the production was moving overseas after they signed a new 10yr contract on the production facilities in 2013. Looks more like they are streamlining/cutting production cost so that on paper the future earnings forecast is much higher. So they can flip the business much easier.
If Stratasys is making too much money somewhere else they might now want Makerbot as a loss leader. There are people out there hired to deliberately lose money while looking like they are trying to make money.
So what happens to thingiverse now - do they leave it up so they can keep patent mining it, or close it down because they no longer court the home market?
@Nathan_Walkner Thingiverse can’t be profitable. it’s a no cost site and the ads are all for Makerbot
so many people in the comments mistaking open source = look at the plans with free (use thereof) .
Many of the conclusions that piece draws aren’t based in reality. For example he theorizes that SSYS gutting engineering and management and that was the downfall. While he’s right the downfall started prior to the acquisition, thinking that those that left/were excused from Makerbot were the solution is dead wrong. They were the problem. They didn’t have anyone that was able either scale the business or address the quality issues and design issues. Without SSYS Makerbot would have cratered a couple of years ago. SSYS bought into the consumer hype, acquired a poor product with failing service in a market that was a bubble. Which cost some people at SSYS their jobs as well. My guess would be it will be the low cost, entry level brand, folded back into SSYS until they decide to deep six it entirely.
@Nathan_Walkner I don’t think you understood what I wrote…
Apparently Hackaday didn’t talk to anyone that knows what actually went on, so the article is unfounded speculation. Hackaday is just a blog for hackers, not any sort of journalism.
My speculation is that Makerbot had the growing pains of any small business, plus if your business hinges critically on technology you MUST get the tech right. 90% of startups fail within 5 years, for well known reasons.