Ann: Redflow enters Voluntary Administration, page-152

I was lucky to get out ever so slightly ahead over the many years I was invested with this stock. What an utter dystopian nightmare roller-coaster.

To me, their Downfall was due to several factors (with the benefit of hindsight of course):

- totally not appreciating how difficult it is to make a battery reliable with moving parts in a hostile environment. You essentially have to over engineer, which pushes up the cost of manufacture and therefore supply - not good in a highly cost sensitive & competitive market.

- constantly pushing the next best version of the battery, so everyone waits it out for the next best version in the hope it will be the right one. Then when that comes around, there is another version that's better just around the corner, so NO ONE EVER BUYS. You don't hear Apple saying they are working on a better phone, yet we all know they do it every year, as it would be marketing suicide There is no such thing as a perfect product, just products you can market & sell and products you can't - avoid trying to sell the latter, and especially don't kill your sales before you start. Also whoever did their marketing needs to really do something else, like flower arranging or cat flossing, totally off point every time.

- management who failed totally to get to grips with the two points above and refocus. The move into telecoms and away from the consumer space was an interesting move (not sure it the right move), but the product was a hard sell, especially against well established solutions that anyone could maintain and keep operational.

Now a smart management would have made the battery more modular, standardised and extendable in useful ways. Stop thinking of it as a battery and think of it as an energy storage platform... Allow people to choose what storage medium they want, just in a handy form factor... That in part would help hide 'issues' with earlier versions, as the upgrade path would allow them to get paid to get out of the hole of their making. So instead of depending on one product, you create an ecosystem and the strong products cover off the weak until they get traction. No shame in making money off things that aren't core, you need to keep the lights on...

I did try to engage with the management on these points, didn't get far.

Of course, there is also the other elephant in room, Australia is a bloody hard place to manufacture anything in or from - I'd say its actually hostile to real manufacturing innovation; I'm not surprised everyone goes overseas at the first opportunity they can.

In short nice tech, but a truly woeful execution.