Insteon being discontinued?

[DAlter01]

14 minutes ago, Teken said:

I'll try to be positive for a moment and say until someone indicates the Nokia site goes off line. I really hope this doesn't apply to the Nokia line of hardware. It really makes no sense to invest all the time, R&D, and certification just to pull the plug at the last minute.

Than again, we are talking about a company run and operated by a complete imbecile. ?

With as much money is floating around in the investment world, I think there must be a buyer for the intellectual property to throw some of the equipment into production and milk sales for many years to come like X10.  It can't be a lot of money since it seems the enterprise value is completely gone as nobody would be foolish enough to do a full install at this point, but why wouldn't they extract some remaining value?  Hubris?

[Teken]

1 minute ago, DAlter01 said:

With as much money is floating around in the investment world, I think there must be a buyer for the intellectual property to throw some of the equipment into production and milk sales for many years to come like X10.  It can't be a lot of money since it seems the enterprise value is completely gone as nobody would be foolish enough to do a full install at this point, but why wouldn't they extract some remaining value?  Hubris?

Let me preface by stating and clarifying why my replies as it relates to the Insteon Management is so harsh. I will also say calling people names is really unnecessary and doesn't help foster a positive outcome in a conversation.

Having said that, specific words and phrases must be used to describe a person and company when they go out of their way to fail. They have failed to offer any public statement since the lead imbecile took over.

In the what five years since he bought out the Insteon brand he and his team have never ever offered a road map of where they are heading or the difficulties they are seeing like everyone else due to market and environmental changes like COVID-19.

As such there was never a line of communication with the public - ever.

Those who have tracked the ongoing events and behaviour such as I. Along with the fact in my previous life was what the industry calls a *Head Hunter* knows the signs of a company pending failure.

As they say all the signs and the writing was on the wall foreshadowing things to come.

As noted so many times here and across the Interwebs I've stated thousands of times. When management is void of any common sense or real leadership as it relates to business.

You're doomed to failure . . .

Any person who has any modicum of basic finance knows the key pillars of staying in the black vs going into the red. Those in business also know relationships and networking are also key to long term success and continued growth.

All of these kill pillars have been void from the people who run and manage this company. 

Why would anyone expect to see something so basic like selling off their IP to someone else happen???

It's not hubris, its just plain stupidity and the inability to have any common sense.  

[MrBill]

59 minutes ago, Teken said:

I'll try to be positive for a moment and say until someone indicates the Nokia site goes off line. I really hope this doesn't apply to the Nokia line of hardware. It really makes no sense to invest all the time, R&D, and certification just to pull the plug at the last minute.

Than again, we are talking about a company run and operated by a complete imbecile. ?

While nokia itself is still online I wasn't able to find the ninsteon lighting products a few days ago.  Someone here quickly told me i was wrong, linking the nokia.smartlabs.com site-- Which does still exist, but Nokia.com appears to have been scrubbed of ninsteon announcements/products.

[kzboray]

nokia.smartlabs.com is no longer available. Server offline.

[Teken]

Yet this company has no decency or consideration to advise their customer base they have folded?!? I'm so happy the Nokia launch was restricted to America only. I would be going postal if they charged my CC and ran away with my money and had no intention of providing the hardware.

[MrBill]

5 minutes ago, kzboray said:

nokia.smartlabs.com is no longer available. Server offline.

Some of it seems to still be around... https://nokia.smartlabsinc.com/collections/all  maybe they never linked from the top level of the subdomain.

EDIT: Actually I'm seeing it here too: https://nokia.smartlabsinc.com/

 

[Teken]

1 hour ago, larryllix said:

They knew what they were doing. The one man "investment company" was paid to shut the place down as gently as possible. Stock was being sold off since the "take-over" of the company.

The only thing the users were scammed on was the hiding of the agenda.

My 4 spare PLMs may come in handy. I may do an IPO for shares in them.

Nobody will every truly know what the overall intent was with this guy. But, his and the companies actions prove out their plan was a epic failure. I could understand the whole lets start up a new company under a different brand.

I can also see and understand shutting down Insteon . . .

I can also see and understand shutting down Smarthome and selling it off.

What I and every person with more common sense than the lead imbecile at Insteon can't understand is the complete distain and lack of communications to the customer base. That they would shut down everything over night without a word to anyone?!?

That makes the lead imbecile running Insteon into the ground and everyone involved a aszzhole . . .

 

[RPerrault]

3 hours ago, kzboray said:

nokia.smartlabs.com is no longer available. Server offline.

inc

shartlabsinc dot...

[larryllix]

17 hours ago, Teken said:

Nobody will every truly know what the overall intent was with this guy. But, his and the companies actions prove out their plan was a epic failure. I could understand the whole lets start up a new company under a different brand.

I can also see and understand shutting down Insteon . . .

I can also see and understand shutting down Smarthome and selling it off.

What I and every person with more common sense than the lead imbecile at Insteon can't understand is the complete distain and lack of communications to the customer base. That they would shut down everything over night without a word to anyone?!?

That makes the lead imbecile running Insteon into the ground and everyone involved a aszzhole . . .

 

Maybe Insteon is just doing a.....

       ready for this?

 

   . . . . FACTORY RESET  

[lilyoyo1]

19 hours ago, Teken said:

Yet this company has no decency or consideration to advise their customer base they have folded?!? I'm so happy the Nokia launch was restricted to America only. I would be going postal if they charged my CC and ran away with my money and had no intention of providing the hardware.

The Nokia bridge no longer works. Tried to log in today

[Teken]

The Nokia bridge no longer works. Tried to log in today

I have to say I’m very surprised to be honest. None of this makes any sense to shutter a new brand even before it comes to market!

This guy is ten kinds of stupid . . .

[Teken]

4 hours ago, larryllix said:

Maybe Insteon is just doing a.....

       ready for this?

 

   . . . . FACTORY RESET  

Well, played . . . ?

[upstatemike]

2 hours ago, Teken said:

I have to say I’m very surprised to be honest. None of this makes any sense to shutter a new brand even before it comes to market!

This guy is ten kinds of stupid . . .

Maybe it was Nokia who pulled the plug because Smarthome couldn't deliver. Maybe the factory pushed the production way out because they are making too much money prioritizing jobs from companies willing to pay a premium to move to the head of the line. Maybe Richmond capital doesn't want to be in this business anymore and would rather just sell the domain name assets and exit entirely. 

Not defending Insteon management but at this point it may have moved beyond anything they can control.

[Teken]

2 minutes ago, upstatemike said:

Maybe it was Nokia who pulled the plug because Smarthome couldn't deliver. Maybe the factory pushed the production way out because they are making too much money prioritizing jobs from companies willing to pay a premium to move to the head of the line. Maybe Richmond capital doesn't want to be in this business anymore and would rather just sell the domain name assets and exit entirely. 

Not defending Insteon management but at this point it may have moved beyond anything they can control.

Sure, let's give them the benefit of the doubt as to what you propose. Does this in any way explain the lack of respect and decency to advise the customer base??? Consider just a moment you literally purchased new hardware with a so called 2 year warranty.

The item breaks for whatever reason because we all know their track record for hardware reliability! ?

Regardless, all they did was pull the plug like a dirty mangy dog and ran away! ?

Even on your last day even if the news was something you really didn't want to hear. They could have said:

Quote

CEO Insteon Imbecile: You know what you stupid Insteon customers. Due to market conditions we are closing shop - oh so sorry!

Nobody would have liked that news but it would have put pen to paper and stated the facts and what is happening. To this very day this stupid idiot and all those who supported this aszz clown have failed to provide any material information to the general public.

I'll stand by my words and statement . . .

This guy is a dirty little weasel, incompetent sh^t, and waste of oxygen mouth breather. 

 

[AgingTechNerd]

On 4/15/2022 at 8:14 AM, JB53 said:

I'm not sure if insteon is being discontinued,  but it seems they went offline yesterday.. I can't connect my hub, thier websites are unavailable,  and none of the phones are reachable.  Does anyone know what's going on? 

Yup same here. Timers still running in the hub but can't access it through the App. Even the Insteon message board seems to be offline.

I had just started the transition from Insteon to Shelly on Home Assistant. I guess I need to accelerate that now. 

I've got a ton of Insteon stuff. Some still in unopened boxes. If any one needs modules I will have no shortage of them. Feel free to pm me. I'm near Toronto Canada. 

[lilyoyo1]

46 minutes ago, AgingTechNerd said:

Yup same here. Timers still running in the hub but can't access it through the App. Even the Insteon message board seems to be offline.

I had just started the transition from Insteon to Shelly on Home Assistant. I guess I need to accelerate that now. 

I've got a ton of Insteon stuff. Some still in unopened boxes. If any one needs modules I will have no shortage of them. Feel free to pm me. I'm near Toronto Canada. 

The timers are local to the hub. You just won't be able to change them. Unless you use the app often, you may not have to rush your change out as much. 

[RPerrault]

http://www.richmondcap.com/

What We Believe

Impact Investing.  We believe that credit analysis is most effective when integrating fundamental quantitative and qualitative credit research with Environmental, Social and Governance analysis.  As a value manager in the investment-grade fixed-income sector, in-depth research allows our talented investment team to make successful long-term investment decisions. Our firm is now 100% owned by 14 active investment, client service, and operations professionals. Decades ago, leadership took the firm private, believing they could closely align their interests with those of clients by becoming independent. Our growth and success since then is a direct result of that decision.

[AgingTechNerd]

1 hour ago, lilyoyo1 said:

The timers are local to the hub. You just won't be able to change them. Unless you use the app often, you may not have to rush your change out as much. 

ok I kind of figured that. I do have Homeseer running. The hub was more of a backup for when Homeseer does it's weekly or bi-weekly lockup.  I could use the phone app for that in the meantime. Thanks. 

[kurelgyer]

In my opinion, Richmand Capital isn't dumb.  They knew what they were doing from the start.  They did what such firms do - suck a carcass dry.  They bought a flailing company for cheap and sold off all the assets.  Of course they didn't give anyone notice - if it was confirmed the end was coming, no one would have bought the remaining product.  They weren't in this to service the customers or provide customer service.  It's been blatantly obvious what was going on for at least the last year or so.  Their silence was the final confirmation.  If they never responded to questions regarding the future of the company, they didn't lie to anyone. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asset_stripping

[stillwater]

@kurelgyer  How does the new, now disappeared,  "Nokia" product line, which required at least some investment, fit with a genius asset-stripping plan? 

 

[kurelgyer]

On 4/16/2022 at 8:31 PM, RPerrault said:

http://www.richmondcap.com/

What We Believe

Impact Investing.  We believe that credit analysis is most effective when integrating fundamental quantitative and qualitative credit research with Environmental, Social and Governance analysis.  As a value manager in the investment-grade fixed-income sector, in-depth research allows our talented investment team to make successful long-term investment decisions. Our firm is now 100% owned by 14 active investment, client service, and operations professionals. Decades ago, leadership took the firm private, believing they could closely align their interests with those of clients by becoming independent. Our growth and success since then is a direct result of that decision.

That's the wrong company.  It is Richmond Capital Partners that purchased Smarthome / Insteon.  Richmond Capital Partners seems to pretty much consist of Rob Lilleness.  https://www.crunchbase.com/person/rob-lilleness

[asbril]

2 minutes ago, stillwater said:

@kurelgyer  How does the new, now disappeared,  "Nokia" product line, which required at least some investment, fit with a genius asset-stripping plan? 

 

I have stayed away from this discussion as I dropped Insteon in 2014. But I agree with your point. What sense would the Nokia development make if the demise was in motion. In fact I am not clear whether Nokia paid for using the Insteon technology or whether Smartlabs paid to use the Nokia brand .... If the former, I would think that Nokia would have done its home work on Smartlabs, and if the latter, then the demise was for sure not planned.

I also read somewhere that Richmond Capital had paid more than $ 7 mio for Smarlabs. I have no idea about the sales volume and margins of Insteon, but on the surface this seems like a high amount unless you have serious plans to develop and expand Insteon. When @kurelgyer mentions stripping and selling the assets, I wonder what assets were stripped and sold, I would assume that if the Insteon asset was sold then there would have been an announcement and convincing existing Insteon users not to look for alternatives.

As mentioned by someone else, the only interesting asset may be the smarthome.com url.

[kurelgyer]

20 minutes ago, stillwater said:

@kurelgyer  How does the new, now disappeared,  "Nokia" product line, which required at least some investment, fit with a genius asset-stripping plan? 

 

Did it ever really exist?  Maybe he tried for a minute and failed.  End result is the same, and the direction has been clear for some time.  Maybe he tried flipping the company to Nokia and they backed out.  Hell if I know.  If I did, I'd be the millionaire.

[kurelgyer]

19 minutes ago, asbril said:

I have stayed away from this discussion as I dropped Insteon in 2014. But I agree with your point. What sense would the Nokia development make if the demise was in motion. In fact I am not clear whether Nokia paid for using the Insteon technology or whether Smartlabs paid to use the Nokia brand .... If the former, I would think that Nokia would have done its home work on Smartlabs, and if the latter, then the demise was for sure not planned.

I also read somewhere that Richmond Capital had paid more than $ 7 mio for Smarlabs. I have no idea about the sales volume and margins of Insteon, but on the surface this seems like a high amount unless you have serious plans to develop and expand Insteon. When @kurelgyer mentions stripping and selling the assets, I wonder what assets were stripped and sold, I would assume that if the Insteon asset was sold then there would have been an announcement and convincing existing Insteon users not to look for alternatives.

As mentioned by someone else, the only interesting asset may be the smarthome.com url.

For what it's worth, the Nokia name was a license deal: "NOKIA is a registered trademark of Nokia Corporation, used under license by Smartlabs Inc.".  Bottom of page https://nokia.smartlabsinc.com/collections/nokia

 

[RPerrault]

4 hours ago, kurelgyer said:

That's the wrong company.  It is Richmond Capital Partners that purchased Smarthome / Insteon.  Richmond Capital Partners seems to pretty much consist of Rob Lilleness.  https://www.crunchbase.com/person/rob-lilleness

good catch 

as for all the captains of industry - bain - worked for romney