When quizzed about this at the AGM RedFlow said that they were now working hard on trying to convert their existing Telco trial installations into committed sales and agreed that their progress on this had been slower than they had anticipated.
Simon Hackett said that although all of their Telco trials have gone well technically they seem to have encountered some hesitation to commit on the part of their partnered customers because it's "all new technology" and it seems no one wants to be the one to actually go first with parting with their $$$.
That's pretty understandable of course, when you look at it from the Telco customer's viewpoint, after all why would you want to 'rush' into paying for a new and un-known technology when the supplier has agreed to provide you with a 'free' trial..?
Obviously the longer you can string them out on the 'free' trial, why the far happier you'll be as a customer, because it gives you more 'free' time to evaluate the suitability and reliability of the ZBM product before you actually cough up your dough. It also buys you more 'free' time to wait and see if anything better or cheaper comes along as well.
That's a small worry for me, ie, are RedFlow now being played for suckers by these large Telcos because of all the above reasons..?
As far as the 'standard' Telco Plug & Play interface goes, that doesn't exist. All of their Telco trials across the globe have been separately installed by different partnered system-integrators who have all separately 're-invented' the same 'interface-wheel' in order to make 'their' ZBMs work in their own installations.
That's what has proven to be another 'hurdle' in the progress of their Telco sales to date ie, because until now, every one has had to be a 'roll your own' job for each of the different system-integrators involved.
That's why Simon Hackett is now bringing the power of his own IT company's considerable expertise to bear on the development of a 'standardised' Plug & Play smart interface, which will now be supplied as an integral 'part of the whole package' when customers buy a ZBM and that's going to be a very good thing for improving sales prospects.
RFX Price at posting:
23.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held