Only if they were purchased by a major player in this industry, ie. Lutron

for what it's worth ... Clipsal now compatible with HAI

Gotta say its rather disturbing to me whenever I hear about someone asking to be "Convinced" about anything.

"You can invest in getting us restarted by sending an email of encouragement..."

Are you kidding me?

When an investor fell through, you gave up once already. Now your going to ask all these dealers to put their faith back in you?

When a companys future hinges on one investor I cant see how anyone would want to commit themselves to using that product.

"Moneys gone, Shut the lights off, Lets go"

3 Days later..

"Hey Someone else wants to give us some money! lets see how much longer we can keep it goin"

Granted, I never went onboard with Vnet, so I'm observing this from the outside. I just cant imagine them ever getting back the trust they build up.

Can someone site an example of a company that had a strong following, Closed its doors, got a new investor, then went on to suceed a second time? None come to mind for me.

None of your points are invalid but this is someones blood sweat and tears, maybe someones life dream. So they are hoping for a miracle and reaching out for some support. I feel for them.

Just seems to me that if there was a Possibility the company could be saved by picking up additional investors, the reaching out should of been done before they locked the doors.

It happens and a lot actually. Especially if you are a dealer that does big jobs. Lutron knows what they are doing and if you are a big dealer they get out of their way to support you. We were bidding on a big commercial project and they sent people - this is in another country - to be with us in the first meeting and presentation and they also checked our proposals.

It is also not uncommon in Europe to send people in another country to solve problems in big jobs and help the dealer complete the project - even residential ones. And they do this free if you have a good relationship with them.

What makes you think it wasn't? Even with large public companies there are usually two stages of reaching out. The first stages is done behind the scenes and in quiet, as much as that is possible with a public company. If that isn't successful they proceed with the necessary announcements and filings while continuing to seek investors.

Lutron does provide quality gear, and they understand QC. They have historically been able to maintain high margins (an attribute the AV vendors how lost) - but Charris is correct - Lutron will lower their price in order to take a project away from the competition.

Bill Maxey

KHARMA!

It been said many times that morons hang out on this thread. It's nice to see your response Jamie addressing the moronic accusations from some of the more respected 'professionals' here.

I count Schneider/Clipsal as a potential acquirer of vNet, if there's anything to acquire.

More predictions here:
[Link: cepro.com]

great article julie . .
lets see what happens.

one things for sure,
installer confidence is an issue for them.

Being critical today are we?

OK, after some words from my pal Q and others, and some time spent investigating the Clipsal/Square-D sites, I retract PART of my statement that Clipsal/SquareD is offering a square peg in a country where round holes are standardized.

I like that SquareD has various sizes of dedicated metal enclosures for their DIN systems which would appear to meet NEC requirements.

The other major platform offering DIN who I was most familiar with (Vantage) only suggested plastic panels from sister company Legrand. Plastic must be OK for panels in Europe, but not here!! Any systems designed for use here would have had to source some Hoffman panels (or maybe Square-D!)

Anyway, part of this was a preconception, and I was pleasantly surprised at the depth of the catalog for dimmers, panels, interfaces, sensors, etc.

I would still hold out before stating that Clipsal/SquareD is the defacto product to replace vNet. There does not appear to be a suitable product for providing multiple dimmers in a module intended to be distributed in finished areas of the living space.

Again, I do not think that this is the correct approach anyway, but it WAS the way that vNet did it.

So vNet had that (stupid) vertical box with the dimmer unit that was aesthetically kinda cool looking.... If I go Lutron, I have the WPMs, if I go Vantage, I have ganged ScenePoints with a custom plate/button combo to make it appear as an attractive and cohesive unit.

It would appear that if I were to go with Clipsal/SquareD, I would have to use a dimmer in the 8M panel.... A panel I would otherwise rather only use in a utility space.

I know that condos and apartments put service panels & sub panels in pantries and closets, but I would expect a residence of a "high net worth client" (vNet's term) would be a little more respectful to aesthetics.

Also, please consider copying someone else's keypads or getting your industrial designers to stop using psychedelics and copying what they see on the dashboards of Minis, Audi TTs, neu-Beetles, and Scions.

The Clipsal Neo and Saturn KPs are pretty out there. They appear to be geared toward Gen-X skater kids, not the baby boomers with deep portfolios who actually buy these systems.

Existing Vnet dealers... Go ahead and gamble on another wannabe.. You wont mind hiding from a new group of clients when they go out of business... right?

Sign up with Lutron or Vantage and be done with it. Let the electricians and Harmony pushers play "science experiment meets startup failure" while you install a solid product that you can get parts and service for next year and the year after.

And don't give me that nonsense about it being difficult to become a Lutron dealer. Effort equals reward.