Pandora News - Of bare boards and investments (2011-10-13)

We're not slowing down here, things are happening and therefore, I'll summarize them for you http://boards.openpandora.org/public...ault/smile.png
As usual, I'll be open about anything here - so if you have any further questions, just ask http://boards.openpandora.org/public...ault/smile.png

1. Bare PCBs ordered and paid!

As mentioned in my last post, I've ordered and paid the bare PCB production, so we'll have the PCBs ready in-time for the prototype production run next month.
They should take about 4 - 6 weeks and when they're working fine, I will immediately order the big batch (1000), which will take another 4 weeks approximately.

This will make sure those will be ready for the production run in January as planned.


2. Investments coming along

The investments are coming along nicely.
Only three potential investors made a retreat so far, whereas 26 confirmed their investment, which adds to a total of 195,000 EUR we've got so far.
I'm still waiting for a confirmation from 15 more investors (which would add another 183,000 EUR) and 28 potential investors haven't even told me how much they are planning to invest.

So, will we get enough investments? Or will things get narrow?
Hard to tell right now. Statistically, with the remaining potential investors left, there should be more than enough money, based on the amount those 26 who confirmed already, invested (most of them were from Germany). Things would work out with 350K EUR quite nicely, though 300K EUR would also be enough.
However, we don't know yet whether and if those remaining investors will really invest.
They've got some things to check out, as tax things are a bit complicated when you're outside of Germany
.
If you're interested in investing as well, send a mail to [email protected]. I'll send you the business plan, information about the profit share you can make (up to 40% interest with 10,000 Pandoras sold per year), etc.

So, what happens if I don't get enough investments together?
Well, there are still some more ways to get things going.
For example, we've got 17000 users subscribed to the newsletter. There might be some potential investors here as well, so I could ask here as well.
I could also ask for small donations. While not all might be interested in the Pandora anymore, there might be some who would still support the idea behind it. If only half of them donated 10 EUR, that would be another 85,000 EUR as well.
Also, crowd-funding like Kickstarter.com and similar sites exist today. Another option.
If just a bit of money is missing, I could also get a bank loan. And I'm still in contact with some bigger investors as well.
So yeah, there ARE more than one way to get things going, and as long as there's some life left within me, I'll continue to work on this http://boards.openpandora.org/public...ault/smile.png


3. Preorders also coming along

As you probably know, preorders have started again.
So far, we got over 250 Preorders already - without ANY advertising at all and without sending the newsletter to the 17K subscribers.
That's impressive, if you ask me!
I think we'll see a lot more preorders once a few more press reviews will be out there (shipping some Pandoras to magazines next week), after the prototypes are working, after christmas, after delivery has started and after the Replay Expo 2011 in Blackpool. It doesn't seem to me we'll have any issues selling the Pandora at all http://boards.openpandora.org/public...ault/smile.png



4. Moving parts

As mentioned, some parts for Batch 2 are lying at CircuitCo and need to be moved to Germany.
Those parts had all been delivered by the distributor EBV (a big german distributor), and thankfully, they are helping me moving these parts over.
They are currently organizing the transportation to Germany, which is great, as they have experts who know how to deal with customs, etc. Saves me a lot of time and nerves.


5. Meet us in UK!

As mentioned above, I will be at the Expo Replay 2011 on 5/6 November in Blackpool.
But I'm not alone - Craig will also be there as well as quite a few guys from the community (and of course, thousands of Retrogaming freaks).

We'll have the iControlPad and Pandoras there, so if you always wanted to meet us or want to see living Pandoras, it's well worth a visit!

http://boards.openpandora.org/index....ts-2011-10-13/