Arduino vs. Arduino

[george graves]

So here's the news.

https://blog.adafruit.com/2015/05/16/big-news-adafruit-is-manufacturing-arduinos-for-arduino-cc-in-new-york-new-york-usa-arduino-teamarduinocc/

This is our super big news folks! Today, May 16th, 2015 Massimo Banzi, CEO and co-founder of Arduino, announced at Maker Faire during the “State of Arduino” keynote that Adafruit is manufacturing Arduino’s for Arduino.cc in New York, New York, USA! We will have more details to share soon, for now – here’s a quote from our Ladyada and some about text for the press folks. Update: Here’s a post on Arduino.cc

[ataradov]

So they found a new CM. What's the big deal?

PS: Plus, have not Adafruit started their own clone of Arduino?

[mtdoc]

Interesting interview with Massimo about this. Here comes Genuino!

[george graves]

So they found a new CM. What's the big deal?

Adafruit isn't a CM.  (They never have been for anyone)

[ataradov]

Except for themselves. And now they want to expand their business. And the risk is very low. The platform is screwed up anyway, so minor problems with manufacturing along the way will not be noticed. I say it is good news for Adafruit, and irrelevant news for Arduino. There are dozens of other CMs that can start mass production of this board in a week or two. They just don't have hacker/maker appeal and resulting product won't be made in the USA.

[mtdoc]

This gives added legitimacy to Arduino.cc IMO. Adafruit has chosen a side, which is no small thing.

[EEVblog]

So they found a new CM. What's the big deal?

Adafruit isn't a CM.  (They never have been for anyone)

So how will they do the volumes?
Are they expanding their manufacturing?

[EEVblog]

I say it is good news for Adafruit, and irrelevant news for Arduino.

Adafruit would have likely carried whatever boards CC got another CM to produce anyway, so it just gets them extra margin.
Maybe some upside in PR from partnering with Adafruit perhaps, but isn't much different to if Adafruit had just supported them anyway.
AFAIK Sparkfun for example are much bigger than Adafruit.

[mtdoc]

Adafruit would have likely carried whatever boards CC got another CM to produce anyway

Except that now we know they will not be selling boards from Arduino SRL

AFAIK Sparkfun for example are much bigger than Adafruit

It will be interesting to see which Arduinos Sparkfun will be selling now. I believe they've had a friendly relationship with Adafruit.

[smjcuk]

In the mean time, everyone went meh and started buying Chinese clones for 1/4 of the price...

[george graves]

In the mean time, everyone went meh

I disagree - You have to understand how powerful the arduino brand is.   Yes.  You, me and most people on this forum would buy a generic "atmel 328 dev board" for $4.

But not the general public.  My sister knows what an arduino is - and she's never soldered or programmed anything other then a microwave.  Yet, she knows the name.  Guess what she will buy for her kid - and arduino.

everyone ....started buying Chinese clones for 1/4 of the price...

Nope - only 0.01% of people(guestimate).  Why do you think people come up with names for things like this?  uCurrent? Arduino, Rasberry Pi.  It's all about the brand.

So how will they do the volumes?
Are they expanding their manufacturing?

I can say that adafruit only runs their PNP 8 hours a day.  When visited by samsung PNP guys/gals, the tech were agasp by that. They are use to having the machines to 3-4 shifts.  So I would say they have a ton of capability.  But if you really want to know - ask Phillip during an ask-an-engineer.  I plan to!  I would like to know as well.

[mikeselectricstuff]

So how will they do the volumes?

Add a night shift perhaps?

[ataradov]

If they sign a proper paperwork, they might have enough money to justify buying another PnP machine. As I said, I perfect opportunity to expand the business with a very low risk level.

[mikeselectricstuff]

If they sign a proper paperwork, they might have enough money to justify buying another PnP machine. As I said, I perfect opportunity to expand the business with a very low risk level.

If they're only running the current one 8hrs a day, they don't need to buy another, especially if it's for a large run that isn't going to need regular new setups - just need to hire someone for nightshifts to change reels & stack boards in & out.

They may need to invest in selective or wave solder for the pin headers though.

[george graves]

They have two PNPs.  One is a SAMSUNG SM482 - forget what the other is(another samsung).  They are tied together - so one can place part of the load, and the other one the rest. 

[bitwelder]

They have two PNPs.  One is a SAMSUNG SM482 - forget what the other is(another samsung).  They are tied together - so one can place part of the load, and the other one the rest.

They expanded the manufacturing capacity some time (one year?) ago with a Samsung SM481. Plus IIRC they have also a fairly capable stencil machine.

[westfw]

I notice that Arduino.org has a new blog entry as well: http://arduino.org/blog/1-the-new-blog/the-full-story-1

It paints a slightly different picture of "Smart Projects" than I had had.   I thought that SP was a generic PCB manufacturer/assembler that happened to pick up the Arduino deal, but whose main contribution was probably a willingness to produce the boards under unusual and somewhat risky terms.  ("You build these with less up-front funding than usual, and you will be THE supplier that everyone comes to.  If we succeed."  Or something like that.)

But the blog entry implies that SP was put together and built up solely for the purpose of building arduino products - "and now they're taking it away."

They could both be partially true; the period in question including some rough economic times, , and perhaps things did not work out as originally expected.  And actual actions matter too.  It certainly looks to me as though the .org group has done things that were ... not right.

The sad part is that there is probably plenty of business for both of them, if they were to pick separate subsets of "stuff", instead of battling...

[donotdespisethesnake]

I notice that Arduino.org has a new blog entry as well: http://arduino.org/blog/1-the-new-blog/the-full-story-1

It paints a slightly different picture of "Smart Projects" than I had had.

Bear in my mind these .org posts are written by Federico Musto, who was never involved with Arduino before he bought out Martino and decided to take on/copy arduino.cc head to head. In my opinion, the way Musto turns things 180 degrees from reality suggests he is slightly mad.

I believe that the original 4 "Arduino founders" brought in Martino to handle the manufacturing side as a fifth "Arduino partner". This appears to have been arranged informally via email, and then money was transferred around bank accounts... the less the taxman needs to know the better..

Having read through the court submissions, it's a real old mess. I think the judge will likely throw up her hands and say "you are a bunch of amateurs and now you expect me to sort it out for you?" Absent a verifiable, formal legal basis on which entity owns the name, she might be tempted to declare all trademarks void.

[gildasd]

A rpactical question from all this mess...

I'm planning a thesis project that does data logging in a hostile environment.
My plan was to use 3 Arduinos and a a bus load of sensors (haha god pun). What should I use? What should I buy?

(Arduino UNO's where the original idea)

[smjcuk]

If it's a hostile environment, not arduinos. They blow up if you fart near them.

[gildasd]

Hostile as in "outside in Belgian weather for 3 months" not as in "bath of Chlorine trifluoride"...

Need one data point, with time stamp, every second from 5 sensors on two test devices for 3 months non stop.
Saved locally on USB and remotely via wifi.

The electronics are not the focus of the thesis, it's just a part of the tooling, so I want to get boring and reliable stuff.

[nctnico]

The electronics are not the focus of the thesis, it's just a part of the tooling, so I want to get boring and reliable stuff.

In that case: buy a readily made solution and don't mess with electronics. It may be fun but you are likely to lose data.

[gildasd]

The electronics are not the focus of the thesis, it's just a part of the tooling, so I want to get boring and reliable stuff.

In that case: buy a readily made solution and don't mess with electronics. It may be fun but you are likely to lose data.

Readily made solutions hit the budget wall... Plus I've yet to find one that does environmental measurements & force at the same time.
I cheched the Siemens ones (school has the software) but even using free base elements, the sensors make unaffordable. And I don't want to make sensors...
So my short list was Arduino, R-pi, Ti school lab dev kits.

[f4eru]

So my short list was Arduino, R-pi, Ti school lab dev kits.

Arduino, R-Pi, don't have RTC. (Don't know about TI) For a logger, a RTC is kind of necessary...

[nitro2k01]

Arduino, R-Pi, don't have RTC. (Don't know about TI) For a logger, a RTC is kind of necessary...

That's what the expansion header is for, is the idea.