For Vera, aside from the cost of the device, there is no other revenue stream that I know of.
Vera needs to maintain support, infrastructure (website, servers, log/backup archive, SMS, bandwidth, etc.), research/development, device upgrade programs, warranty, etc.
The HA market continues to grow, but so do competitions and other [more mainstream] options. To me, Vera has been more of a boutique, tinkerer’s HA system. It’s certainly not for everyone–that limits its marketability.
I do not know if Vera turns us into a product – datamining, selling marketing data, but I imagine that other HA system do.
Clearly, Vera is still around and recently introduced new products. The upgrade cycle somewhat maintains their revenue stream, but I am having trouble seeing the math work out for a long-term, profitable operation.
I’ve been asking myself the same question. With Vera gaining a partner and eventually looking to provide security type contracts, it seems clear that they’re looking for ways to increase revenue. It does seem to be apparent that the company is a little cash constrained at the moment. I only say this because of the pace of improvements and products.
Unfortunately they seem to somewhat ignore a very real resource, which is their user base. What’s made them successful has been their acceptance of a somewhat open source platform with apps being developed by their own customers. Unfortunately these types of platforms are ONLY successful with a very strong user base with the skill to do this. I’ve always thought that they could improve aspects of their business model around enabling and educating their user base, which would in turn continue to build apps, which in turn sell more devices.
A typical home has a finite number of devices that really could be automated. Eventually, upgrades in hardware will no longer be needed to support the number of devices. As a company you can either expand and pick up other products like thermostats, security contracts, refrigerators, etc, and/or you can expand and pick up market share. It’s an American company, so vertical integration in an electronic device seems mute.
To me it seems that the easiest and most cost effective approach would be the path of blowing away the other competitors with application support provided by the most knowledgeable user base. It’s a relatively small investment followed by loads of free labor.
Z-Waver hit it on the head. The Vera unit isn’t GetVera’s main revenue source. In fact, I would go so far to say that the Vera units that are sold to us are used to beta test MiOS solutions that are then sold to other automation companies.
Of course GetVera will never go so far to admit that we’re unofficial, unknowing beta testers but the writing has been on the wall for years. We get a relatively cheap controller and in return GetVera gets to throw the garbage on the wall and sees what sticks. Of course I’m using hyperbole but I think you get the point.
As long as you are aware of the situation, and accept what it means it’s fine. But there are a lot of people that don’t realize this and are befuddled by what seems to be very confusing actions by GetVera.
I concur with the above. Considering the price of the controller and the free support I have no problem being a ‘beta tester’ of what is basically a proof of concept. H*ll, I’ve been beta testing MS Windows since before XP. Anybody recall Windows ME, Vista and Windows 8? Why do you think MS is giving Win10 away for the first year? Not for being nice. They are trying to get as many Win7/8/8.1 users onto Win10 and monetize them. By default Win10 is worse than Wikileaks. Your data is shuttled back to MS so it can be compiled an monetized in much the same way Google does with your web searches. You’re not a customer to them, you are a product, a revenue source. Which is the new business model for a lot of internet companies.
MIOS/getvera makes the bulk of their revenue from OEM solutions and I’m sure the issues we find in Ui7 translate to fixes for their OEM solutions as well as for Ui7. To me that’s a fair trade for no monthly fees.
There may be some monetizing on Vera’s side as well although I’ve not figured out what that would be.
Since their was a rumor a few months back of a major feature developed by an OEM that would also be incorporated in a Ui7 firmware I am wondering if that’s part of the reason for the absence of monthly firmware version. That and the last few versions introduced about as many new issues as old ones were solved. So chances are the agile development model was canned in favor of a less frequent update cycle with hopefully better QA.
But the current developments (or lack there of when it comes for the Vera firmware) makes you wonder what those OEM’s will do. If no future they will surly shop else where and then Ezlo needs to look for other revenues (like monthly fees to look at you controller status?? )
It seems that Melih answered this in a different thread:
Given the fact that he openly mentioned that he knew that the product is broken…
…probably the OEM part is the reason for which he bought the company.
“Power your products with trusted firmware currently used in over 60 countries” - I’m wondering what firmware is referenced here though: obsolete broken vera or new ezlo?
new ezlo fw for
we have it for zwave, zigbee and wifi…
So anyone who wants to turn their product into a “smart or connected” device, we provide the pcb boards and firmware in them (these are all ezlo firmware). We also provide a cloud infrastructure (brand new one we have built) as well as customizable apps.
Lets say a coffee maker can take our pcb and connect the pins from our pcb board to their coffee maker inside their pcb…and turn their product into a smart and connected product.
I bought the company because it had great engineers. It was a way for me to speed up development of the Ezlo platform. However the engineering organization was not properly set…Great people but no process or structure…We restructured the engineering/development processes added all these great developers/engineers into Ezlo development capability, now we have one of the largest Home Automation development resources in the world!
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Best Home Automation shopping experience. Shop at Ezlo!
Why do you think MS is giving Win10 away for the first year? Not for being nice. They are trying to get as many Win7/8/8.1 users onto Win10 and monetize them. By default Win10 is worse than Wikileaks. Your data is shuttled back to MS so it can be compiled an monetized in much the same way Google does with your web searches. You’re not a customer to them, you are a product, a revenue source. Which is the new business model for a lot of internet companies.
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