Phantoms delivered this afternoon

[thumb5]

I think it's almost as important to look at the founders of the company and their background. John McFarlane (CEO) and the other 4 co-founders had made a ton of money from the sale of Software.com at the height of the dot com boom in 2000. Their background was in selling messaging systems to telcos, so I think it's fair to say their background was in software. As others have mentioned they also had a very clear vision of what they wanted to do and the money to achieve it too. Being near Silicon Valley also probably helped in getting access to the best programming minds around.

Guillaume, that's an interesting point.  If I understand, you're saying that Sonos had the luxury of taking time to build their stuff "right first time" because they had their own funding rather than having to meet deadlines to satisfy venture capitalists, etc.

[GuillaumeB]

I think it's almost as important to look at the founders of the company and their background. John McFarlane (CEO) and the other 4 co-founders had made a ton of money from the sale of Software.com at the height of the dot com boom in 2000. Their background was in selling messaging systems to telcos, so I think it's fair to say their background was in software. As others have mentioned they also had a very clear vision of what they wanted to do and the money to achieve it too. Being near Silicon Valley also probably helped in getting access to the best programming minds around.

Guillaume, that's an interesting point.  If I understand, you're saying that Sonos had the luxury of taking time to build their stuff "right first time" because they had their own funding rather than having to meet deadlines to satisfy venture capitalists, etc.

Indeed. I also think they were software people used to building rock solid applications for utilities (i.e. telcos). 

Guillaume

[thumb5]

Mind you, didn't Pierre-Emanuel Calmel work for Nortel before Devialet?

[GuillaumeB]

Mind you, didn't Pierre-Emanuel Calmel work for Nortel before Devialet?

Indeed - check out some of his work here, quite a few patents in transmission technology and networking:

http://patents.justia.com/inventor/pierr...uel-calmel

To put what I'm saying in a bit more context, my guess is that Calmel was working in small teams in a research facility at Nortel, basically inventing better ways of doing stuff. John MacFarlane had already built a massively successful software company and the merger with Phone.com was in the billions. He basically assembled a team of ex-software people to launch Sonos.


Guillaume

[IanG-UK]

Indeed - check out some of his work here, quite a few patents in transmission technology and networking:

http://patents.justia.com/inventor/pierr...uel-calmel

To put what I'm saying in a bit more context, my guess is that Calmel was working in small teams in a research facility at Nortel, basically inventing better ways of doing stuff. John MacFarlane had already built a massively successful software company and the merger with Phone.com was in the billions. He basically assembled a team of ex-software people to launch Sonos.


Guillaume

Interesting that Mathias Moronvalle, who I thought ceased to be a partner in Devialet at quite an early stage, is shown as a joint inventor on a patent issued recently with Devialet as the assignee.

[Jwg1749]

Interesting comments there, guys!

I will modify my position and agree that what Sonos managed to achieve 13+ years ago -- in terms of functionality, ease of use and robustness -- was pretty amazing.

I think I'm right in saying that last year the only company in the world that sold more speakers than Sonos was Bose.

Matt

[stonedragon]

For those that mentioned that their Dialog gets hot, mine suffers from the same problem as well.

I called the guy at Harrods and he told me that they leave the Dialog and the Phantoms on. Personally I haven't taken his advice and switch them off every night. Its got to be better for the components right? I switch them back on in the evening when I want to listen to some music and everything seems to work just fine.

[cthroughblue]

I have been reading what has been said about software being hard to implement and things. I don't doubt that it is very hard. I just feel that if you buy something that cost as much as the phantoms or even half the price it should be the responsibility of the company to make sure that it works. There is no mention on the website that you will have to bear with them until they have worked out bugs and until that point it will be an unstable platform and might not work as promised.

I've lost count how many times i have set up just my single phantom. And how many times the app restarts itself or sound drops out. and I'm using a dedicated router with nothing else on the network.

rant over ........... sorry just annoying how good they sound but let down on the software side.

[thumb5]

I have been reading what has been said about software being hard to implement and things. I don't doubt that it is very hard. I just feel that if you buy something that cost as much as the phantoms or even half the price it should be the responsibility of the company to make sure that it works. There is no mention on the website that you will have to bear with them until they have worked out bugs and until that point it will be an unstable platform and might not work as promised.

Yes, I agree absolutely - the fact that software is "difficult" is no excuse because a product development company should be able to assess correctly how much effort is required to implement the whole thing so that it's in a saleable condition when it comes to market.

There's a saying in project management which applies here: "time, cost, and quality - pick any two".  Too often companies choose a short timescale and a low cost, and there's no chance of a high-quality result.

[cthroughblue]

Exactly. It has taken years to develop so why unveil it and take preorders when its not in an acceptable working order. why not just wait until it is working as it should.

As sparks is the only way to control it and play any kind of music on it surely the software is just as important as anything else.