I’m not dismissing concerns, I’m simply asking that they go in their own thread instead of derailing every new news thread with old discussions that have been hashed out with the same folks many times in those previous threads. I’ve invested as much time as I’m willing to at this point, explaining and re-explaining reasoning around past well-known delays over the last few years, discussing our policy change in how we share information post-Aspen, and explaining how estimates based on the best information at the time, can change when a new problem arises. People can choose to believe my explanations or not. If not, then I don’t see how more explanations from me would help anything.
If people want to spend more time having those same discussions they are free to–in their own thread–but over the past few months I’ve had to be more hands-on in trying to keep these news thread discussions on topic, because these threads were continually being taken off topic in the same way by the same people and I was starting to get complaints from people who were trying to have on-topic discussions in the thread.
I definitely want Purism to succeed with the Librem 5. But if the management thinks that we do not know that new pre-orders are going to keep the doors open for the next six months while no shipping will occur, they are mistaken. So why not be completely transparent and give us some hard numbers?
At some point, that production ramp for the Librem 5 is going to have to become exponential to reach shipping parody. I have never seen Purism talk about how they plan to build that exponential ramp-up. If Purism is not talking about it, they’re almost assuredly not thinking about it. All we know is that Purism is planning to wait-out the existing supply chain problems. That seems to be where it ends. Two years from now, most of us will still be waiting for other reasons.
Might i suggest a dedicated community manager / PR & Marketing person and/or taking your frustrations to Todd Wheeler rather than taking your frustrations out on customers. As CSO i fully understand it frustrates you, its weird that you are sometimes the community manager,others at other times in the first place. And i think you proved my statement, if past issues remain unadressed ( from the customers perspective, not yours) there will be a cumulative build up and issues will bleed into official news threads wether directly related or not.
Im not sure why you want the customers to both service you and themselves. I have nothing more to say because since 2018 what i know is that purism is as it is,good and bad and the only thing i can change is wether i spend any money in the future. the language of business.
I would also donate if Purism could provide some information like this. I would love it if I could subsidize someone getting their Librem 5 before the end of 2021 (or 2022 for that matter). Even if Purism ends up paying $3000 per phone to keep shipping them to customers, if the community is willing to foot the bill, why not?
Thank you @todd-weaver and @Kyle_Rankin for the update, I appreciate those updates which are necessary for transparency and trust.
Is it planned to procure all parts for all bought librem 5s once the market shortage is over (as expected for October) to avoid further risks in not having parts because of some other shortage next year?
Thanks for the update. Just one question (I thought this fits the most in this topic but not quite sure):
Out of curiosity, are the Librem 5’s which will be produced after the shortage exactly the same as the first Evergreens hardware-wise? Couldn’t find information about wether there have been made or will be made any adjustments. Maybe @Kyle_Rankin can say that?
I wouldn’t be able to say with 100% confidence at this point whether the hardware would be identical or not. The pause in production would give us time to look into potential changes/improvements but it’s too early for me to say with certainty whether that would actually happen.
Please note that he said I wouldn’t be able to say with 100% either way. So if they do change the design or if they do not change the design, please do not claim that Purism was deceiving us.
Since more customers are starting to complain at the delay, if we could be provided detailed listing of manufacturers, the supply chains, where they dig raw materials from, etc. We could go there to see where the workers are. Find out where they live so we can kick their beds to wake them up and drag them to their workplaces. Pay them bonuses. If they’re in China, promote their communism propgranda machine. What’s good for us is good for them. What’s good for them is good for us. Then hopefully everybody’s happy.
I think that another part of this supply chain disruption that bothers me is about how Purism was caught off guard. Granted, the whole industry was suddenly hit with unexpected shortages. I get that. But Purism has one big, no… not just big, but very very big advantage that almost no other company ever has. It’s major, and I think this is what angers me most when I see just how off-guard Purism was and how lightly they punt in the game now.
Typically with most products, you have no way to be sure what your future demand will be. Will your competitor release a better product and suddenly your sales drop? Will there be a drop in the economy that no one could have predicted that causes sales to drop off? What happens if we produce too many of this year’s model and no one buys them before we release next year’s model? Purism should be absolutely IMMUNE to any and all reasonable fears of this type of risk or possible misfortune that comes from holding too much inventory on the Librem 5. Ramping-up for Purism now is mostly their own labor for manual assembly and testing, if they would have planned ahead with reasonable prudence for several thousands of the pre-paid orders they’re sitting on.
Why didn’t Purism place orders for the CPU and other core (difficult to get) components well over a year ago? Was there a risk at that time that the CPU may need to be changed? (Answer: No). How can you be sitting on several thousand pre-orders and not think to purchase most of those components until just now? Ford and Chevy and Maytag may all have good excuses right now. They don’t have pre-orders for everything they might sell. They have a just-in-time model. Why in the world would Purism not plan ahead, given the thousands of pre-orders, at least enough to be capable of keeping some shipping of a small amount of inventory now? Todd mentioned that even the resistors can go up in price. Most surface mount resistors come in large reels in the thousands per reel, for five or ten dollars total per reel. If the price of those reels doubles, then you pay twenty dollars for the reel instead of ten dollars per reel. The cost of discrete resistors and capacitors in the Librem 5 is virtually nothing, for any practical purpose, especially when you have people waiting for years of backlog to be shipped. Most other Librem 5 components are equally trivial in cost when bought in quantity. I design and layout and order printed circuit boards all the time. PCB fabrication is a buyer’s market now. PCBs are a commodity that are relatively cheap also with typically a eight to ten day turn-around time on an eight-layer board.
It looks obvious to me like Purism did NOT plan to ramp-up shipping of Librem 5’s anytime soon, under even ideal supply chain conditions. If they had those plans, they could ship at least some product now, even if it’s a bit painful. Instead they punted as lightly as possible several months ago or over a year ago even though they’re sitting on thousands of pre-orders. They’re shipping nothing for the next six months. This bad news should have been delivered to everyone who might place pre-orders six months or a year ago, instead of dropping this bad news now. With several thousand pre-orders waiting, that is wholly unacceptable even given the current disruption to the global supply chain.
Purism knew or should have known the bad news months or over a year ago and didn’t disclose it when they knew it. There appears to have been no real ramp-up plan that was otherwise interrupted by this ball and supply chain since Purism should have no need to subscribe to JIT themselves until after they hit shipping paity. Purism punts lightly now instead of doing what they can now to ship something, anything with respect to the Librem 5. These are the kinds of arguements that Attorneys Generals and courts might consider when trying to decide if the violations are civil or criminal in nature. Whatever inconveniences might be involved, I strongly urge Purism to ship at least some constant level of product over the next six months and unfortunately, Purism should disclose the risk to those who pre-order going forward, given that there appears to have never been a viable ramp-up plan.
because essentially he said absolutely nothing!