Al la carte versus All you can eat – the rise of the virtual cable operator

Recent announcements by the FCC proposing to change the interpretation of the term “Multi-channel Video Programming Distributor (MVPD)” to a technology neutral one has thrown open a lifeline to providers such as Aereo who had been teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. Although it is a wide open debate if this last minute reprieve will serve Aereo in the long run, it serves as a good inflection point to examine the cable business as a whole.

“Cord cutting” seems to be the “in-thing” these days with more people moving away from cable and satellite towards adopting an on-demand approach – whether via Apple TV, Roku or now – via Amazon’s devices. This comes from a growing culture of “NOW“; rather than wait for a episode at a predefined hour, the preference is to watch a favorite series at a time, place – and now device of ones choosing. Figures estimate up to 6.5% of users have gone this route, with a large number of new users not signing up to cable TV in the first place. The only players who seem to have weathered this till date are premium services such as HBO who have ventured into original content creation, and providers offering content such as ESPN – the hallmark of live sports. Those who want to cut the cord have to end up dealing with numerous content providers – each offering their own services, billing solutions etc. To put together all the services that users like, ends up being a tedious and right now – and expensive proposition.

This opens the door for what can only be known as the Virtual Cable Operator – one which would get the blessings of the FCC proposal. Such an aggregator (could be Aereo) could bundle and offer such channels without investment into the underlying network infrastructure – offering a cost advantage as much as 20% as compared to current offerings. This trend is a familiar one in the Telco business – and cable companies better be ready for this. Right now they may be safe as long as ESPN doesn’t move that route – but with HBO, CBS etc all announcing their own services, I believe it is only a matter of time. While the primary impacts to cable has extensively been covered – there are a few other consequences, and opportunities that I would like to address.

The smaller channels (those who charge <30c to the cable operators) will experience a dramatically reduced audience. Currently there was a chance that someone would stop by while channel flipping – with an al la carte service – this pretty much disappears, and along with it advertising revenue. An easy analogy would be that of an app in an app store – app discovery (in this case channel discovery) becomes highly relevant. Another result is that each channel would be jockeying for space on the “screen” – whether a TV, tablet or phone. I can very well imagine a scenario of a clean slate design like Google on a TV, where based upon your personal interest you would be “recommended” programs to watch – question is who would control this experience…

Who could this be –  a TV vendor (a.k.a a Samsung – packaging channiels with the TV), an OEM (Rovio, Amazon etc.), a Telco or cable provider (if you can’t beat them – join ’em), or someone like Aereo? The field is wide open and the jury has yet to make a decision. One thing however is clear – the first with a winning proposition – including channels, pricing and excellent UI would be a very interesting company to invest in…..

In defense of Uber

A few months ago, I had penned some thoughts about the ride sharing battles taking place in Continental Europe, be it the mytaxi or the Lyft’s or the Uber’s of this world. Now, having finally moved back to the Bay I have been a liberal experimenter in all forms of the shared economy to get a better hang on how things move state-side. After having taken over 40 odd Uber/ Lyft rides and having a cheerful discussion with every driver from Moscow to San Francisco and Mexico I would like to revisit and re-examine those deductions.

In San Francisco, the traditional cab business has taken a nose-dive with the regular taxi cab companies losing close to 65% of their regular business and warnings that the viability of their enterprise was at stake. This figure was not surprising; if you’d just take a walk and look around; you would find just as many Ubers and mustachioed Lyfts as regular cabs. Armed with a tech savvy population primed to use the latest apps, and discount after discount offered by the deep pocketed Uber if I was surprised of something it would be questioning why the drop wasn’t even more dramatic!

Upon closer examination of the claim that Uber was destroying the livelihood of the taxi driver, I believe that this is a fallacy since in many locations a taxi driver (if his/ her car met Uber/ Lyft requirements) could become an Uber/ Lyft driver as well. Issues such as “Uber’s dont’ know the neighborhood, or they have not passed the  KNOWLEDGE in London ” fall short since navigation technology has progressed to the point to render memorizing entire maps and routes irrelevant. Couple this to addition of user based services such as Waze and I daresay technology trumps the brain.

The two segments that ARE being affected (and consequently the loudest complainers) are the taxi-dispatch companies and the local governments. The first is simply being automated by a service which is more efficient and transparent and well, the second loses on a expensive medallion (or the permit to drive) revenue. If there is a danger to the taxi/ Uber driver in the future, is that an indiscriminate issue of too many Uber “permits” would create too high a supply and not enough economical demand to feed so many drivers. It may not impact the person who would like to make a few bucks on the side, but would turn out to be a risky proposition for those who are leasing new cars just to drive Uber. It sounds tempting to make a quick buck – but driving cabs for long hours is not for the faint hearted…

I am less concerned of issues such as market dominance and monopolization – both from a free market and regulation perspective. In the former, any attempt towards the same would see the rise of alternatives emerging to offering cheaper alternatives (since the technology itself is not unique), and in the latter – governments have time and time again shown the willingness to step in; in this case the Uber would once again become like the regulated “yellow taxis” of old.

But for now, they are here to stay – and all moves to provide efficient, safe and effective transportation to the masses must be applauded and encouraged. GO Uber!

The new battleground – Uber/ MyTaxi against the world!

Last year, I penned in an article around Airbnb and the upheaval this industry is facing. A that time I had likened it as a “David vs Goliath” fight  – the individual renter on one side versus the big bad “industry” on the other. If one looks at the news feed these days coming out of Uber, MyTaxi and others – I have to wonder, did I by any chance get the “David vs Goliath” reversed?

I use both these services, and my recent experience in Moscow re-emphasizes just this need. If you are a tourist, try hailing a cab and negotiating a decent price; in most cases you end up with a smelly cab paying double if not triple the price. Try Uber, and you are chauffeured around in a luxurious S-Class Mercedes Benz, many equipped with free Wi-Fi for a lower price and a clear emailed receipt at the end. No wonder, for tourists in a strange country where local cabbies are accustomed to well – “taking people for a ride”, such services are a godsend!

But how about the better, efficient taxi services in places such as Berlin? They are forced to compete on prices using apps such as MyTaxi, or by limousine services such as Uber. Or take London, NYC etc – where the cab drivers have to take an exam, pay medallion fees (which in places such as NYC can cost a fortune) – how are they expected to compete with the “private Uber’s” of this world? Even lawsuits in this realm seem to be a bit ridiculous, such as what is happening in London. Transport for London allowed Uber on the justification that “Uber’s kit does not require a physical connection between the device and the vehicle”. Well, take this argument to an illogical end then you may have payment POS solutions using NFC or some other sensing technology arguing that they may not need to pay merchant fees since they didn’t have any “physical contact”…. Such arguments are simply frivolous, and loose sight of the bigger picture. Yes, Uber, MyTaxi etc are using a mobile device – but this device is a clear replacement to the taxi meter – if it wasn’t sitting somewhere in the car, there would be no way to compute a fare!

Authorities all around the world do need to move quickly towards a compromise – with all parties (the authorities, taxi companies and the new upstarts) coming to a agreement which has world wide applicability. What could this look like?

• For authorities – it may herald the end of these costly license fees and strict regulation. This may be especially necessary in regions/cities which have an acute paucity of public transport. This does mean that they either lower/ eliminate fees for the taxi firms, or charge anyone who uses his/her car for such services a similar payment (or based upon hours of use). This may lead to lower tax revenue, but would improve overall transport. There is definitely a risk that accidents may increase due to unskilled drivers – but this risk is mitigated by evaluating and approving drivers before being allowed to join such as service.
• For registered taxi services – it would mean to focus on improving customer experience, even banding together to provide a similar service. No one likes to have a different app per city, but if taxi companies really want – they can work together to create a viable alternative. This is akin to partnerships by Telco operators and other regional players, as a defense against a global OTT player who have a global footprint
• For upstarts – funnily enough, wouldn’t recommend anything apart from to get ready for increased competition. Any rulings similar to the above recommendations would move towards leveling the playing field;

Consumers would undoubtedly benefit with an increased availability and better customer experience. In the end, isn’t that the end result of what innovation does – provide viable alternatives, forces legacy providers to improve and innovate and enhances our quality of life.

Friction-free: enabling happy customers

Last week, I had the good fortune to attend MBLT 2014, a conference all around the rapidly evolving mobile ecosystem. Among the many speakers at the conference, two which piqued my attention were those from Spotify & SoundCloud; both speakers were engaging, and interestingly enough – both talked about growth.

When we talk about growth here, it wasn’t all about entering new markets, or creating new products. It involved a lot of small elements; elements which when brought all together ensured that you gained a lot of users and who kept coming back. Although Spotify and SoundCloud operate in the music space, both (currently) focus on different aspect of this segment. As Andy @ SoundCloud succinctly put it; if Spotify was the Netflix of music, then SoundCloud was Youtube. However, each company seemed to have a common approach when it came to customer acquisition – to develop a friction-less sign up process.

At its core it simply meant reducing the number of clicks, mouse moves etc required to sign up a user and/ or a customer. Both agreed that if any sector was to be considered as “best practice” then it would be mobile gaming – and the king of the hill was… well, King.com. The makers of Candy Crush had got this bang on – all you had to do is download the game and you were good to go.

Their mantra was -> Number of clicks to sign up = 0. Number of users = millions!

Both SoundCloud & Spotify were always on the lookout to make the whole signup process, simpler, quicker and more efficient – fully aware of the fact that complicated processes turned away prospective users, and getting them back wasn’t a trivial matter. That point got me examining different websites to see just how much this mattered (a study done by Spotify as well).  After some pottering around, I couldn’t but wholeheartedly agree with the rationale of such an approach.

If you now compare this mentality with IT solutions at traditional corporations you realize how far behind the curve they are in this respect. Many systems there are built more with the paranoia of security and little consideration for user engagement.  These are what I call “push systems” – where employees have no choice BUT to use these services mandated by IT. The direct result is that either personnel shy away from using these services, or doing so becomes an irritating chore (especially since they use better designed services on a daily basis). Rather than a full scale rebellion, we are seeing services which simply assist existing ones services such as Brisk.io gaining traction because continuously updating SalesForce is tedious.

A takeaway would be for IT personnel to closely work with  end users in deciding how they would like to engage with the services they use on a daily basis. Focusing on small but important elements such as “clicks to complete entries” etc will make employees more enthusiastic on using such services making these more an aid (which was the purpose) rather than a chore!

The nascent VC – Fools rush in!

The good folks at SeedCamp invited me to be a mentor for SeedCamp week in Berlin, and never to miss an opportunity to discover new trends and companies I signed up for the same. The event was very smoothly run, with quite a nice mix of startups ranging from education to financial management, fashion and sustainable farming. Most of them good ideas, but as serial entrepreneurs caution, an idea is one thing… execution is everything.

However, this post is not about the startups – but more about the investor community who were milling around. Before I arrived, I thought I had a good idea of the players within this ecosystem; after yesterday I realized on how much I had undersized this segment. There were players I had never even heard of, and suddenly it seems that there are a lot more VC’s than companies! Some of these firms are niche so if you are not in that industry you may never have heard of them. But among some of the others, I admit if I would be one of their LP’s then I should be justifiably worried. Some definitely seemed qualified, many born out of established VC’s; however there were many running around speaking in platitudes interspersed with jargon. Maybe this impressed some, but left me wondering about their actual capabilities.

The challenge I realize is that there just aren’t a sizeable number of high quality investment opportunities. If you are a good startup, with a good product – you literally have all the VC’s knocking on your door. In this case, major firms such as Earlybird have an advantage since they are well known and can provide you with good, solid advice to help you along the way. Conversely it means that a no-name VC would have to simply outbid an established player (i.e. cough up more cash for lesser equity) just to get a chance to get a foot in the door. They may still lose in this game since most good startups realize the value of strategic advice over money and may still decline such an offer; as Peter Witt (my professor at WHU) liked to say – if you want dumb money, ask your dentist; he will give you the money, and offer no advice!.

What are your options then – well, you then have to target the “not so good firms” to invest. Well that increases your risk…. an odd saying in what is already a highly risky business. Who stands to lose – well, the LP of course! Not only this, even startups should be cautious in working with these – to carefully evaluate what (apart from money) other resources are offered. If you can get money from one, then perhaps you can get money from another – see what else is on the table in terms of support.

But all in all, Berlin is now becoming an increasingly attractive place for folks to come and set up a business. The key is to set up – and hopefully with a well connected Angel investor – who has the right connections and contacts to the right VC’s. So when you grow (with the right advice and investment) you are automatically in the inner circle to help you get to the next stage. And if you are one of those who isn’t sure that his idea is there yet – Berlin is an even more attractive with money floating around…. it wasn’t like this, and not sure how long this will last…. but now it is there… so grab it!

Partnering at large corporations – secrets to succeed!

In the era of consolidation following the economic crises, many firms turned towards a ‘protect the core’ approach. One often adopted approach was the slashing of R&D budgets and consequently a diminishing pipeline of new products. These now lean companies are facing a new problem – what do you do when your core itself is shrinking! This is being fueled by rapid technology changes which allows substitutes to enter the market, many with a compelling service offering, and many times free of cost!

Given an option to either make (i.e. reinstate the development that you just fired), buy (who knows if this is a hype or will work?) – many large firms are turning to the third, the partner option. At the highest level this would seem simple – there are no integration headaches, no large in-house development costs; but many are realizing this is not as easy as it seems. This is best illustrated by a simple analogy, ‘have you ever seen an elephant dance with a mouse?‘. Nonetheless, rather than give up on what is and should be a clear cornerstone of new products offerings to keep customers happy, large companies can make some concrete steps in this direction.

• Make sure that the partnering and venturing team has the full backing of the management. This simply boils down to the fact that partner products should always be evaluated on par with similar internally developed offerings – no step-motherly treatment here.
• Ensure that the team understands the partner mindset. At best this would also mean that a few members if not all have past experience in such an environment. It is quite difficult to understand the challenges, needs and wants of small firms if you haven’t quite done it yourself.
• Do not subject your partner to the internal functions, realpolitik and bureaucracy in your organization. Instead work hard to make your own internal processes lean, efficient and less cumbersome. Best way to look at it – treat the partner as you would a customer; keep him happy! It is amazing how beneficial this could be to other divisions in your organization as well.
• Invest in being able to effectively manage multiple partnerships. Managing the first 3 – 10 are easy, managing 50 is another story altogether. This does not imply additional layers of complexity – but recognize the need to be abreast of and manage partner needs. The Microsoft way – i.e. categorize partners based upon a few select KPI’s (e.g. revenue, strategic interest etc) and then accordingly assign resources to them is quite effective in this respect. Have to give them credit here – they do know how to manage (without strangling) their partners to a good extent.
• And with all partners – do not be afraid of failure; monitor the progress, recognize if and when it is failing – and move on. Do not throw good money after bad.
• Finally – be patient. The above points may sound simple but do need some time to fall in place and for you see tangible results. Give yourself the time, and make management aware of the same. Last thing you need is the fruits of your labor falling apart halfway through because unrealistic short-term expectations have been set!

Corporate Venturing – Boom or Bust

Hardly a month goes by when you do not hear of an announcement of another large corporate jumping the venturing bandwagon. Like all things, this seems definitely the ‘in’ thing at present. No CEO would want to be caught dead on the ‘what are you doing for innovation’ question – a corporate venturing, whether as a incubator or an accelerator program seems to be the way to go. Depending upon the amount of spare cash they have – fancy offices are opened in Silicon Valley; if you have smaller budgets – then you need to make sure you at least have a prominent location in your home turf.

Although I readily admit I have no statistics to determine whether we have seen any real ‘successes’ from these endeavors, but from the murmurs I hear from insiders, and from some startups who have gone through the process – there seems to be a ton of hot air. There are several reasons for this – but I want to put some thought on the basic structural issues.

For most if not all – this is not a management priority. Sure, you definitely see the entire management with all smiles for the inauguration event, but dig deeper and one realizes that this is perhaps only of peripheral interest. Whenever such a situation occurs, this is a disaster waiting to happen. At every downturn, or ‘consolidation’ in management speak the incubator runs the risk of having its funding severed – cutting the very lifeblood it needs to survive.They are typically managed like the large parent. Many corporate incubators, although starting with the promise of being independent  in the end are closely managed – and in many times staffed by personnel from the parent. While in theory this is not such a bad thing, reality is that a startup, seed business is very, very different from the life at a corporation. What you hence end up receiving is either too many processes or procedures, or some cut & paste lean copy of existing corporate structures (this is what the management is comfortable with remember!). This to a large extent, serves to burden the startup – at worse, frighten away good ones.

What it does do however -seems to boost the rating of the company, in particular its management in front of its share-holders. Who doesn’t like an ‘innovative firm’

The result is that many of these firms literally spend a good deal of money publicizing themselves. Maybe this is a strategy which does help the company’s share price!

The management at these corporate incubators receive a salary…. why is that important you ask? well – i call it the ‘getting wet’ problem. Managers are made just too comfortable in the venture. This makes them less likely to take risks – since well, they don’t have anything to loose. Behavioral science teaches us just that, people fear losing a lot more than they enjoy winning. Try asking a corporate venturing manager to take a Euro 10K salary per annum – with the possibility of an endless upside (and downside) … you get the story

If these hypothesis are right, it does lead to the credible possibility that many of these ventures are on life-support, rather than thriving. And worse still – at the sight of the next roller-coaster ride in the economy – many will simply be left to rot. Pity – given independence, a strong (and incentive driven) management and the freedom to fly (even at the cost of cannibalizing the parent) – we may yet see a jewel emerging from this.

Have to admit – I do not want to be a naysayer here, but if things do not change, and soon…. it may only be a matter of time….

To Pitch as a Pope – Lessons for an entrepreneur via Pope Francis

You are not the front runner; in fact people don’t even know who you are. They expect one of the favorites – you do not fit the mold of the most eligible candidate by most (if not all) polls. But yet – here you stand, in full glare and knowing that the entire world is watching you, evaluating and interpreting your every move. You have just a few minutes to make a first impression – and you know that this has to count. This was the m-o-m-e-n-t yesterday, as aptly described by the CNN article when a relatively unknown Archbishop from Argentina was named Pope.

Of course, this is a totally different level altogether from an entrepreneur pitching in front of an audience of investors – in many ways it is simply not comparable (with one big factor being that the entrepreneur may have spent endless nights perfecting his pitch while the Pope – well, he may still be coming to terms with the fact that he life has dramatically changed forever before he addresses his audience). However, as I watched the whole episode live on television yesterday, I realized that in those brief moments there were some valuable nuggets which each entrepreneur (and for that extent anyone) could use. This is what I would like to analyze and share today. If you haven’t already watched it, then I would urge you to do so (NBC has a full slideshow, and so does the NYT among many other news services) – the points below would make a lot more sense

1. If you hesitate at the beginning don’t fret – it is only human to do so in what may be an uncertain (and perhaps unfriendly) environment. But do genuinely try to reach out to your audience. When Pope Francis emerged, he definitely would have known that the people were still scratching their heads to figure out who he was. His first gesture was that of a slight hesitation, but followed through with a friendly wave. This was a far cry from the clasped hands of past Popes; it was more a down to earth, “hello there” gesture which connected with the teeming masses gathered below. If anything – it served to break the ice.
2. Understand your audience and address them appropriately – this is genuinely difficult to do if you are trying to address the entire world. But his use of Italian (instead of the more archaic Latin) and simple, well paused sentences allowed him to directly reach out to the people. Entrepreneurs could well learn to keep language simple, be direct and to the point rather than ramble on. If thoughts are complex – make them simple. People understand SIMPLE far more than anything else – although many would love to believe otherwise
3. Be watchful of the unspoken word – inasmuch as people pay attention to what you say, they also pay attention to your non-verbal communication. This is not only important for your audience but many a time equally important for your employees. The Pope’s display was simply masterful here – upon entering he insisted on being on the same level as the other cardinals, rather than on an elevated platform. This and his choice of clothing, preferring a simple white garment compared to the deep red vestments sent a clear message to his own. In a company, this type of message can be critical – maintaining and boosting employee morale when they see their CEO among them, rather than choosing a helicopter status.
4. Get your audience engaged and excited about what you have to offer, be genuine and passionate about it. People can and will recognize a smoke-screen. As it has been said, you can fool a person only so many times. Here the Pope did work the crowd in his own inimitable way. He made a small joke, but more importantly asked the people to pray for him before he blessed them. Remember, here is the guy who for Catholics is God’s CEO on earth – he should be the guy blessing them, but is humble enough to ask people for their prayers. This simply captivated the audience. As an entrepreneur, do recognize that you may not be the best at everything, you are talking to investors or other people in the audience because you need something. Being sincere and humble about it is important. The right people can understand and appreciate that.
5. Always thank your audience – if there was a parting master-stroke this was it, when the Pope requested the microphone after the announcement and thanked the audience for coming and wished them a good night. Remember, he didn’t need to do so – they were there of their own volition. But in reaching out once again, even if they forgot what he had said earlier they were left with a warm and positive impression in their heart. An entrepreneur could well keep this in mind, even though your audience may have come to invest in you and seek returns, still they are taking time out from other things – even if it just for 5 minutes to hear you. And even though they may be interested in investing to seek returns, there are few who will invest if they don’t like the person. You have 5 minutes to make yourself likable – make it count.

This is pretty much what I could gather in a nutshell, perhaps there are more. Although none of what I have written is new or rocket science, just seeing it in action was nice – as for me I was left with a nice and happy feeling in my heart.

If I were an investor – I would have invested in him!

The user (UN)experience

I cannot claim to be a customer sales or usability expert, but a personal experience just this past week acutely brought to the forefront of how important and relevant a good customer and user experience is – both to keep a customer and protect the reputation of a firm. Sharing this not as a matter of criticism since I cannot blame any party (they were simply following rules) but hopefully to open the eyes of those that make these decisions which need to be followed.

I found myself in Germany, and needing an internet connection went to pick up a data SIM. I had a router (one of those which would take in a 3G signal and provide a WiFi output) and figured that all I needed was a SIM card with a few Gigabytes of data which could be recharged at will. I had done this all over the world – from Saudi Arabia to South Africa so figured that this would be a 5 minute, grab and buy exercise. It turned out everything but that.

For starters, the operator actually didn’t seem to have such an offering, a bit odd since I would expect that this would be the bread and butter business of a Telecom provider. Or perhaps he did but the sales personnel didn’t seem to quite find the right product. If I may note – he had to peruse through a thick manual, I couldn’t blame him if he himself didn’t know the product existed or not. But all was not lost, as he pointed out a cheaper alternative provided by their no-frills subsidiary. It came with a USB stick as well which I didn’t quite need but he assured me that once activated I could transfer the SIM card to my router.

Then the fun started. Once I came back to my desk (thankfully close to the shop) I figured out that in order to use the device I needed to activate the SIM – and the main way to activate the SIM was to go online and register. Made me wonder a bit – if you wanted a data-stick, then perhaps you did NOT have a means to go online in the FIRST place! This was never the case anywhere else in the world, wondered why it was a requirement in Germany.

Did that – but still nothing. I duly returned back to the shop and pointed out my dilemma. To their credit they quickly set me up with a trainee technician who knew English. But then there was another ‘issue’. According to strict protocol since this was a ‘no frills’ sub-brand they didn’t actually provide any support. In addition – if I did ask for support in installation then I would have to pay ‘extra’ for this service. Again a bit strange, since if the device wasn’t proving to be as simple to operate as the manual said – and no support was provided then what use is the device in the first place! But again, with a bit of coaxing, the tech support got permission to assist me for ‘free’. Now we figured out that we needed to install a new driver and you needed to be …. (you guessed it) ONLINE to download it. Oh well, it now seemed that to use the device you needed to be online in the first place!!!

We worked on that from his machine – and still no luck. We had now activated the SIM and installed the update but apart from a flickering green light there was no sign of life. The Tech support called his supervisor who tried using another dongle – same result. We then researched on Google to figure out the problem – from perusing forums its seemed that the drivers did not work with 64 bit systems – even stranger since most modern OS used it. So perhaps, this was made for older laptops…. in that case why keep it? We got on the phone with the subsidiary in an attempt to explain the problem so that I could return it – but from what I gathered they were very reluctant to do so, and the store seemed to have a no return policy for such a device.

I came back the next day, one night of trying had led to no success, the technician although wanting to take back the device was limited from what he could do. I have been asked to come back to speak to a ‘Business Manager’ on the following day.

This brings me back full circle to why I posted this – maybe it is a bit of venting some frustration, but it also the seemingly lack of thought for the user experience in the design of the product. From the customer support personnel, it is the sad acknowledgement that although they can help, their hands are tied and we have to escalate several levels to hope for resolution. Shouldn’t it be the case that if for a brand new product that refuses to function as designed, even though thoroughly tested by their own technicians there should be a no questions asked return policy, instead of forcing the customer to repeatedly revisit their store.

The company would be poorer in that respect – losing a customer who determines that some of the products are badly designed, the support staff are unable to provide the support he needs. They may be $20 richer in selling me a non-working device, but several orders of magnitude poorer in reputation. Long term value – is thus eroded