Yeah definitely! And apologies for the delay – legal seems to be moving slower than we’d like.
The big picture is this (and then I’ll break it down to the smaller picture, but it definitely helps to see things holistically):
- We are bringing on a COO in the next week or so – this is part of the overall larger announcement that I’m closing on
- The Letter of Intent has been signed and the final paperwork is on his desk for review. I’m sure there will be minor back and forth’s, but overall the LOI captured everything so I don’t anticipate much.
- I can’t disclose the company he is the CEO of, but just know it’s one you all have heard of and is heavily respected in the industry (which will help us tremendously – more on that below). He and his team will have dual-roles in that they will stay with their current company, but ours will work together with theirs and they will take on the operations and sales responsibilities.
- I will be able to focus on marketing/branding and Eric M will be able to focus on the tech side of things (as right now we’re having to manage everything and we’re way outside our expertise).
With that in mind as the big picture, how this helps the 5-Button is this:
- The company we’re partnering with has some major pull with manufacturers, our Z-Wave one included.
- We are no longer this, “small company” who they can man-handle and play games with. We’ve followed the rules set out by them after, “the incident” (described above in the thread) and they still held this project hostage (as well as some other things). Now we will have the negotiating power of the larger company and have many different paths to take if this manufacturer does not want to play ball (also, since you’ve pre-ordered the 2-1, I want to be clear these are different manufacturers we’re talking about – the 2-1 is made by someone else).
- Over the next couple weeks (I know I keep saying that – I’m trying my best to give the best estimates, but things seem to take longer than I anticipate), an investment group will be reaching out to the manufacturer to talk about a path forward. If it’s determined there is no path forward, then we will be moving over to the Zigbee manufacturer and discuss with them a timeframe on finishing this project. It may also mean we put this in front of the fan switch as this one has been out longer – I’m not entirely sure.
Hope this helps a tad?
At the very least, what I’m trying to say is that there’s a much bigger picture that we’re trying to work on to set us up to negotiate this project and get past a lot of the red tape that has been put in place. And that bigger picture is exciting, but also taking forever.
The 5-Button is one of the top priorities in the negotiation package. I’ve told them we have people who have been waiting over a year with no resolution and it’s extremely embarrassing for us and extremely frustrating for our customers.