Lots of sad eyes & tears. 
I really do like the concept of being able to have a few around the house for scene control–and using the LEDs to indicate which one is active. Fingers crossed you resurrect this thing somehow.
My vote is to switch this to zigbee ASAP and I’d keep my preorder on the table.
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Full disclosure, this is definitely where I’m leaning as well. Especially after beta testing the new ZigBee devices we’re making – they can do everything Z-Wave does, are compatible all hubs + Alexa Echo Plus devices, and would be a great scene controller for Philips Hue bulbs.
We also don’t have the same supply chain issues as we do with Z-Wave.
Only downside is that I think we would have to switch manufacturers and start the tooling process over. Not a huge deal, but kind of annoying as we’ve already paid for tooling with the current manufacturer.
At this point, I’d cut bait and just make the move. While most of my house is zwave, I don’t mind having a healthy mix of both protocols. It’s more important to me that I have the same look and feel of switches on the wall vs going to buy a competitor’s version. If you can source zigbee 3.0 and maintain functionality as designed, just go for it.
You can keep my preorder deposit if you go that way!
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I replaced all of my dumb switches with Inovelli’s in 2020. My choice was based upon user feedback and rating, functionality, look and feel, and corporate reputation.
I agree with @jws6. Please make the switch to Zigbee 3.0 as soon as you can and keep my preorder deposit for that version.
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Maybe give people an option of refund, Zigbee or wait. While I was all “z-wave” for a long time, I recently discovered zigbee and so far it has been a lot easier to handle and strangely enough a bit more reliable. At this point I would also prefer the Zigbee version
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@Eric_Inovelli I agree convert to zigbee and keep deposit. I am looking forward to this device either protocol and the zigbee fan control switch. I very much want to get all switches the same look and feel.
I’m personally torn about which option I would choose. I have zero Zigbee stuff, and am in the process of deprecating my Hubitat with the only Zigbee radio in our house. The 2.4 GHz spectrum here is already cluttered with IoT stuff…despite my neighbors being 8,000+ acres of state forest and wooded land. I have no intention of changing to Zigbee.
With that said, I did my pre-order of this switch as an impulse buy, with no plans for where/how to use it. I think that I’ll let my money ride on the Zigbee version, if for no other reason than to have a Zigbee device to experiment with.
It sounds like Silicon Labs shot themselves in the proverbial foot with the 700 Series chips, and may have put a fork in Z-Wave’s future market viability thanks to their single-source business plan…
What @jws6 said. Moderately annoyed at where Zwave has gone after replacing an entire house full of Insteon with it, but here we are. I chose VHS in the early days, so batting 0.500. 
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Just a quick update – we are currently RFP’ing between the two manufacturers. They have both been out on Chinese New Year, so I haven’t been able to hear back.
There is also a lot cooking behind the scenes in terms of some potential acquisitions, mergers, partnerships and B2B deals (not just in terms of the 5-Button, but this is a major part of it).
I should have the full picture in the next week (2 tops) – this is where the March 1st self-imposed deadline came from 
Very exciting times and I can’t wait to tell everyone!
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Very exciting stuff indeed. Looking forward to the news @Eric_Inovelli! I really appreciate you and your team’s tenacity — and of course your products. Keep it going and count me in once the pre-orders open for the ZigBee version of this and the Zigbee version of your Blue Series dimmers. I still have 8 more dimmers in my home that are ready to graduate to the Inovelli club.
My take ZigBee vs ZWave echoes several others commenting here. I went ZWave a long time ago and I was convinced that I made the correct choice. I now have a home with a combination of both but it’s still ZWave dominant. Just this morning I experienced yet another ZWave network nightmare. I have quite a few 500 and 700 series devices now and I have to say I think the network was better when it was all 300 series. I am yet to experience such nightmare with my ZigBee devices.
I wanted to ask (and in particular ask the beta testers) — what is it like adjusting “preference parameters” for zigbee devices? None of the ZigBee devices that I own have such parameters so I am very curious. One of the strengths of ZWave seems to be how it exposes “tunable” settings such as min/max dimmer values, warm/cool CCT constants, timings, neutral/non-neutral, etc etc etc. Recently I have been testing three different ZigBee LED strip dimmers. Neither expose a means of setting the CCT value for the connected white emitters and worse still — that CCT value is hard coded into the firmware running on the device! You can’t even bypass or override it in the device page (Hubitat) or the configuration page (Home Assistant). So I’m very interested how Inovelli, a company who produces devices with countless preference/parameter/tunable settings will transition/promote their devices into the world of ZigBee and carry forward one of my favorite design features.
Thanks,
Richard
Sadly, you’ll have to wait. The beta testers are under a NDA, so they won’t be commenting. Eric or Eric might, however.
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There are some interesting developments with Z-Wave.
Just about a week ago, SiLabs released a firmware update for 700 series controllers that supposedly fixes a massive bug.
The controller was periodically not able to transmit.
In my mind, that seems like what we causing all kinds of issues on my c-7 Hubitat. At least, I had been suspicious that it was going radio silent at inopportune times, because that would explain many of the problems.
So, fingers crossed that was it and that Hubitat is able to test it and get it rolled out.
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Very curious how to perform a firmware update of the internal 700 series uC in the Hubitat device. I’ll ask the same question about a USB stick connected to Home Assistant.
I was asking in a more broad sense not specifically pertaining to the Blue Series devices. From what I have experienced with ZigBee devices “preference” type parameters do not exist and Inovelli devices tend to leverage lots of them.
They have a built in update process.
Typically, when a new Hubitat update is rolled out, they include it. You generally will see a button to initiate the z-wave upgrade.
They did an earlier one last year.
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A major radio flash from what I recall.
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Just to throw my hat into the ring…I don’t mind waiting for the ZigBee version of this. It stinks, but I have no aversion between ZigBee and Zwave.
On a personal note, the way Zwave industry is going it definitely put a kibosh on my general designed plan or approach when I first started on my Smart Home journey…install all switches Zwave and any outlets (if I ever do that ) or sensors ZigBee-based and then address any outliers (e.g. wanting a gas turn-off valve to be ZigBee but they only have Zwave) on a case-by-case basis. So if I have to stop installing any more Zwave stuff, so be it. Only now I have to re-consider the impact of so much ZigBee to what I am trying to do in having a VLAN for my WiFi cameras (what I am calling my home surveillance subnet)…ugh, well, I wouldn’t be a techie if it wasn’t “fun”, right?
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Project Update: I want to give an update that, while still doesn’t give a definitive answer, I think gives some hope.
TLDR: We’re in the process of a merger/partnership/shared resource scenario (can’t release final details, but I can after March 14th) that will fund this opportunity and also put us in a much better spot from an operations standpoint. I will be able to fully give a timeline and project status after March 14th after the shareholders meeting.
Longer story and context:
I will post an official update regarding the company after March 14th, in which there is a special meeting for shareholders, but one of the areas we as a company struggle with (and me personally as it rests on my shoulders at the end of the day) is operations which is an area that makes or breaks companies as it represents the day to day grind of negotiations with the manufacturer, shipping, forecasting, etc.
My background is in marketing/branding, whereas Eric M’s is in technology. We’ve had to be scrappy and learn along the way how to handle operations, which has been especially challenging over the past couple years, let alone the last 5+ we’ve been in business. To be blunt, we’re getting railroaded by manufacturers and just about every investor has said the same thing, “your brand is amazing, your products are the best, but… your manufacturers are crushing you”. Which, is true.
Over the past year or so, I’ve gotten to know the President one of the top IoT companies (guarantee everyone in this forum has heard of the brand) and along the way we had this epiphany that our strengths compliment each other – he has a background in operations/negotiations and mine is in marketing/branding and each other’s business suffers from the other person’s strength, so why not help each other if we can.
This has led to many discussions about sharing resources and/or an equity purchase in Inovelli.
That said, we’ve gotten to the point where a final offer is being presented to the shareholders on March 14th to hopefully make this happen along with some backup offers who are also interested in coming on in operations role.
So, what does that mean for the 5-Button? Great question!
One of the major exercises we’ve been working on is the product roadmap for Inovelli and being realistic on what can and cannot happen (right now). Taking the current cashflow of the business, the current economic status of supply chain, and ultimately working with manufacturer(s) to get past the red tape that’s been hindering us.
We’re in the process of finalizing the financial model and wrapping everything up by early next week so that I can present this to the shareholders on March 14th. If all goes well, then we will execute the game-plan that is extremely exciting for us and ultimately for you guys. I wish I could say more.
The 5-Button switch is an integral part of the game-plan because not only is there a major need for it in a B2C market, but there’s an even larger demand for it in the B2B market as many MDU (multi-dwelling units) companies are requesting some sort of in-wall remote to activate scenes.
The merger/partnership/sharing of resources has a major focus on B2B and they view us as a premium line that would take on premium competitors (Lutron, Control4, etc) for a value price. Their portfolio is also missing an in-wall remote, so this is very attractive to them.
Regarding timeline, I know I gave myself the deadline of March 1st, and again, at any point if you’d prefer to just take a refund and come back later, you are more than welcome to do so – I completely understand. But, I should have not only some overall exciting company news, but a more definitive and confident deadline for this switch (as well as others) after March 14th (give me like an extra few days after).
Thanks again for everyone’s patience and understanding. It means a lot.
Happy to answer any questions, but know I need to be somewhat vague on the details until it’s finalized.
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I think the transparency deserves what ever time you give us you have the money already so I am in for the ride, Just get me an Inovelli hat and all is good wink wink! All kidding aside based on the quality of the other devices I have by your company it will be worth the wait. Thanks for being the company you are.
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