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Topic: [BitFunder] IceDrill.ASIC IPO (235 Thash Mining Operation powered by HashFast) - page 97. (Read 378675 times)

sr. member
Activity: 252
Merit: 250
I could have sworn I saw DeaDTerra make a post about purchasing from other companies if they could get a better deal. Why was this post deleted?

Smiley You saw correctly. I asked DT to remove the post because the announcement was premature.

Please know that there are other companies in the space who are interested in our ability to purchase large amounts of hashing power. Some chip manufacturers see the benefit of focusing purely on their core competency (chip design & production) and like the way we've opened our offering to the community at large (decentralization of ownership). We've all seen the problems mining hardware companies have had up until now with sales execution, customer support, shipping logistics and all the important things that go along with delivering these machines far and wide. Doing it this way gets their product out there faster, smoother and with much less hassle than shoe-horning marketing/support/logistics team onto an already extremely-busy design team. As tech companies they agree that rapid company growth places negative pressure on their technical development agility. e.g. If you have a chip designer directly answering customer/sales support questions then you're doing it wrong.

My apologies if it the post removal seems a bit "cloak and dagger", but we agree with senseless when he asked the question:
Doesn't it seem kind of silly to only purchase hardware from hashfast?

It does. We have a 25% expansion clause to fulfill and relying on a single manufacturer for servicing all our future expansion needs is not only short-sighted, but also bad business practice. If other manufacturers can deliver hashing power which fits well with the IceDrill's enterprise-level, high-density compute cluster we simply must have the conversation with them. Any announcements relevant to this topic will be made when/if the documentation to support them are finalised, not before.

EDIT: grammar

Is Avalon one of those companies? 
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
Will Icedrill be selling old hardware to the public as it becomes antiquated?

The topic of handling hardware obsolescence is something we'd like to defer until we have the 1st generation of hardware in-hand. Where possible we'd like to re-use as much hardware (PCBs, PSUs, cooling equipment, etc) as possible and implement chip replacement rather than dealing with the logistics of public sales/distribution. That sentiment can change though, depending on what's most profitable. Sorry, the best answer I have for you at the moment is "it's too early to say".


What kind of salary is management taking for their duties in running all of this?

Maintenance costs of running the IceDrill will be on an ad-hoc and contractual basis and will be clearly listed as such on financial reports. We have no current plans for salaried employment. We'd rather fix issues than pay someone to switch the machines off and on when there's problems Tongue Oh the stories I can tell from when I worked in banking....

Thanks for the response!

You're welcome, keep the questions coming.
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
I could have sworn I saw DeaDTerra make a post about purchasing from other companies if they could get a better deal. Why was this post deleted?

Smiley You saw correctly. I asked DT to remove the post because the announcement was premature.

Please know that there are other companies in the space who are interested in our ability to purchase large amounts of hashing power. Some chip manufacturers see the benefit of focusing purely on their core competency (chip design & production) and like the way we've opened our offering to the community at large (decentralization of ownership). We've all seen the problems mining hardware companies have had up until now with sales execution, customer support, shipping logistics and all the important things that go along with delivering these machines far and wide. Doing it this way gets their product out there faster, smoother and with much less hassle than shoe-horning marketing/support/logistics team onto an already extremely-busy design team. As tech companies they agree that rapid company growth places negative pressure on their technical development agility. e.g. If you have a chip designer directly answering customer/sales support questions then you're doing it wrong.

My apologies if it the post removal seems a bit "cloak and dagger", but we agree with senseless when he asked the question:
Doesn't it seem kind of silly to only purchase hardware from hashfast?

It does. We have a 25% expansion clause to fulfill and relying on a single manufacturer for servicing all our future expansion needs is not only short-sighted, but also bad business practice. If other manufacturers can deliver hashing power which fits well with the IceDrill's enterprise-level, high-density compute cluster we simply must have the conversation with them. Any announcements relevant to this topic will be made when/if the documentation to support them are finalised, not before.

EDIT: grammar
sr. member
Activity: 434
Merit: 250
I could have sworn I saw DeaDTerra make a post about purchasing from other companies if they could get a better deal. Why was this post deleted?

You saw it.
legendary
Activity: 1029
Merit: 1000

Why would you not also buy from others? Doesn't it seem kind of silly to only purchase hardware from hashfast?

Buying from one vendor you can have bigger discounts and as a big customer better service.
sr. member
Activity: 292
Merit: 250
Will Icedrill be selling old hardware to the public as it becomes antiquated? What kind of salary is management taking for their duties in running all of this? Thanks for the response!
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
Yes as there doesn't seem to be much investor confidence as you can see by the price shares are going at right now.

I can't really speak for investor confidence as gauging it is not my forté. I can only work towards successful delivery of our goals. That said, the current sell "wall" of around 330 BTC represents <2% of share sales up until now.

I figured that by increasing your number from 0.0016 to 0.0017 then maybe those 7 Million shares will start getting eaten up which is much more beneficial now than it will be if they get eaten up later (as far as negotiations with HashFast are concerned)

While we'd love to make a world of promises to sell the remaining 7m shares, we also feel that it's much more important to be able to deliver on those promises. The increase you're proposing is non-trivial.

You do have quite a bit of private shares, I'm not sure of the exact number as I'm writing this. After 0.0016 the dividends would just about be 1/2 of what they were I believe? I could be wrong on this.

See:
No, definitely not 1/2, the maximum of private shares is around 30%. See:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2938623 for details of the variable breakdown.
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
At what stage is Hashfast in their 28nm chip design process?

When is/was tape-out?

The design is complete. They're taping out this week.


See:


Yes, of course. 

Certainly a lot more information regarding the GN chip.
Also about us, how we got here, the company, the Baby Jet, etc.

This is all info we've been meaning to get out for some time, but taping out a chip is an extremely intense process.
It's ending now - we'll be posting a lot more information, leading up to our tape-out this week.

Eduardo deCastro
Founder and CEO, HashFast


newbie
Activity: 34
Merit: 0
At what stage is Hashfast in their 28nm chip design process?

When is/was tape-out?
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
Based on the announcements of the pricing for multiple other companies that are close to 1/2 the price of HashFast, will you be fighting for a better price from HashFast?

Our close relationship with Hashfast has not impeded our resolve to fight tooth and nail for our investors.

Also to build investor confidence, can you please post pictures of where you plan to host these units once it is ready?

Yes, definitely. We're finalising our decision on the deployment location this week. Once that's done we'll keep everyone updated with as much detail and visual support as is possible. This will be our main focus in the coming weeks leading up to the receipt of the hardware. Along with actual pictures of the space, I'd like to leverage some of my (very basic) 3d visualization skills to illustrate the full magnitude of what we're doing while the deployment/customization/build-out is in-process.

Can you guarantee a return of 0.0017 in Dividends to Investors before "private investors" take their share so the remaining 7 Million shares can be guaranteed a small return?

The 1st amendment of the IPO states that at least a 0.0016 dividend (total) will be paid out before the private shares are allowed to float. Dividend payments will continue after that point. Are you asking that we increase this number from 0.0016 to 0.0017?
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
will, what's your estimated time until we are hashing?

The estimated delivery date for the hardware is October 25, 2013 (from our sales agreement with Hashfast). We'll start hashing as soon as we have the hardware in-hand.
legendary
Activity: 1176
Merit: 1015
will, what's your estimated time until we are hashing?
full member
Activity: 179
Merit: 100
Hi All - just a couple of updates from Hashfast that we're able to share now that they've made the information re: imminent tape-out public:

How confident of shipping to customers are you if you have not taped out yet.
Very confident.
We are currently conducting a mock tapeout, and have already sent our GDS-II to the fab.
We are very very close to final tapeout.
-John

and

Does the expected ship date of late October still look achievable?
Yes. We are exactly on track.
-John
donator
Activity: 1064
Merit: 1000
I know IceDrill is still in their IPO phase, but its kind of scary when you look at the current share distribution now during "phase 3", where the majority is supposed to be sold...
Top 1% of share holders currently own 85 % of issued shares...  Huh

IceDrill.ASIC
Total shares: 30 000 000
Shareholders:  427
Average share per owner: 70 257
Top 1% (4) shareholders: 15 500 000, 7 000 000, 2 182 855,  750 804
Sum top 1% (4) : 25 433 659 (85% of total)

Compare that to ActiveMining or AsicMiner:

ActiveMining
Total shares: 6 898 797
Shareholders:  700
Average share per owner: 9 855
Top 1% (7) shareholders:  642 022,  261 514,  243 573,  219 275,  177 280,  160 568,  154 360
Sum top 1% (7) : 1 858 592 (27% of total)

G.ASICMINER-PT
Total shares: 13 525
Shareholders:  396
Average share per owner: 34
Top 1% (4) shareholders: 1 345,  865,  740,  659
Sum top 1% (4) : 3 609 (27% of total)

You're being a bit unfair there.  If you look at ASICMINER you have to compare to the actual company not one pass-through.  Bitfountain hold over 50% of the ASICMINER shares.  And you're counting in treasury shares for Icedrill there - which distort the picture during IPO.  No idea what current share model ActiveMining have but last time I looked Ken (plus friends/family) was still getting 40% or so of all shares.

Beyond that I think it's fair to say investors are starting get mining-share-fatigue now : there's just been too many new offerings where people will make investors rich from mining/ASICs in return for a mere 10-50% of whatever gets mined/sold (Icedrill no longer falls in that particular category after the changes to the contract).  Now that those who just wanted to throw away their cash have done so it's much harder for new mining outfits to raise funds.

After the contract changes and clarifications my view is that Icedrill is one of the better value offerings out there IF you believe mining will be profitable.  My sole remaining signficiant issue with it is that it gives away equity as means of taking management fees.  Whilst one of the main problems with that has been addressed with the contract changes, it's still a horrible way to do things - leading to significant issues if there's a change in management team (this may have been addressed in whatever contracts managment have with Icedrill - but no disclosure has been made in respect of it) or closure.
To clarify,
The account that holds the shares is the issuer account,
5.5 million of those shares are additional shares that will be paid to bulk purchase investors.
Please also read the changes of the IPO and how this effect the share count, it is important for the point you are making.
//DeaDTerra
hero member
Activity: 532
Merit: 500
I know IceDrill is still in their IPO phase, but its kind of scary when you look at the current share distribution now during "phase 3", where the majority is supposed to be sold...
Top 1% of share holders currently own 85 % of issued shares...  Huh

IceDrill.ASIC
Total shares: 30 000 000
Shareholders:  427
Average share per owner: 70 257
Top 1% (4) shareholders: 15 500 000, 7 000 000, 2 182 855,  750 804
Sum top 1% (4) : 25 433 659 (85% of total)

Compare that to ActiveMining or AsicMiner:

ActiveMining
Total shares: 6 898 797
Shareholders:  700
Average share per owner: 9 855
Top 1% (7) shareholders:  642 022,  261 514,  243 573,  219 275,  177 280,  160 568,  154 360
Sum top 1% (7) : 1 858 592 (27% of total)

G.ASICMINER-PT
Total shares: 13 525
Shareholders:  396
Average share per owner: 34
Top 1% (4) shareholders: 1 345,  865,  740,  659
Sum top 1% (4) : 3 609 (27% of total)

You're being a bit unfair there.  If you look at ASICMINER you have to compare to the actual company not one pass-through.  Bitfountain hold over 50% of the ASICMINER shares.  And you're counting in treasury shares for Icedrill there - which distort the picture during IPO.  No idea what current share model ActiveMining have but last time I looked Ken (plus friends/family) was still getting 40% or so of all shares.

Beyond that I think it's fair to say investors are starting get mining-share-fatigue now : there's just been too many new offerings where people will make investors rich from mining/ASICs in return for a mere 10-50% of whatever gets mined/sold (Icedrill no longer falls in that particular category after the changes to the contract).  Now that those who just wanted to throw away their cash have done so it's much harder for new mining outfits to raise funds.

After the contract changes and clarifications my view is that Icedrill is one of the better value offerings out there IF you believe mining will be profitable.  My sole remaining signficiant issue with it is that it gives away equity as means of taking management fees.  Whilst one of the main problems with that has been addressed with the contract changes, it's still a horrible way to do things - leading to significant issues if there's a change in management team (this may have been addressed in whatever contracts managment have with Icedrill - but no disclosure has been made in respect of it) or closure.
member
Activity: 66
Merit: 10
I know IceDrill is still in their IPO phase, but its kind of scary when you look at the current share distribution now during "phase 3", where the majority is supposed to be sold...
Top 1% of share holders currently own 85 % of issued shares...  Huh

IceDrill.ASIC
Total shares: 30 000 000
Shareholders:  427
Average share per owner: 70 257
Top 1% (4) shareholders: 15 500 000, 7 000 000, 2 182 855,  750 804
Sum top 1% (4) : 25 433 659 (85% of total)

Compare that to ActiveMining or AsicMiner:

ActiveMining
Total shares: 6 898 797
Shareholders:  700
Average share per owner: 9 855
Top 1% (7) shareholders:  642 022,  261 514,  243 573,  219 275,  177 280,  160 568,  154 360
Sum top 1% (7) : 1 858 592 (27% of total)

G.ASICMINER-PT
Total shares: 13 525
Shareholders:  396
Average share per owner: 34
Top 1% (4) shareholders: 1 345,  865,  740,  659
Sum top 1% (4) : 3 609 (27% of total)
newbie
Activity: 34
Merit: 0
Can someone please build a CDO cashflow waterfall spreadsheet with difficulty increase modeling? If so, then we can properly value this thing. (I am obviously not smart enough to do that)

Flat out modeling with difficulty seems to totally miss this 'credit enhancement' structure, which should be worth a LOT.

The shareholders getting paid 0.0016/share before private investors effectively acts as a thick credit enhancement on a CDO, right? Sorry, I am just trying to wrap my head around whether this is a good investment or not.

Sorry for my bad math. If private shares is 30% , you are somewhat getting something like extra protection with 7:3 ratio (ie. for every public share, you get extra ~0.43 share that helps to pay your principal back). then instead of buying at 0.0016, it's more like 0.0016/1.43 (initially before private investors get paid). that's close to 0.0012/share? that sounds like a steal to me. or am I smoking crack?

i don't think Icedrill has miners protection program (since it was not stated anywhere) but I think this 'credit enhancement" is way better than miners protection program. What's the point of hosting more hardware if hosting cost would not operationally break even?

(...)
Does HF's "Miner protection plan" apply to IceDrill?   If so, that may help, since 10Mh/s could end up about 50Mh/s if the ROI is bad.

Good question. Even if it did, what's the time-frame on receiving those extra chips? Weeks? Months?

I believe IceDrill has Miner Protection.

If they don't make 100% ROI within 3 months. November - December - January, then they will give them up to double or four times as many chips as originally purchased in order to make their ROI. It will only be chips though.

That combined with shareholders getting paid 0.0016/share before private investors should make this a fairly safe bet (If you trust DeaDTerra and HashFast)

It's going to be a long wait though!
newbie
Activity: 34
Merit: 0
The shareholders getting paid 0.0016/share before private investors effectively acts as a thick credit enhancement on a CDO, right? Sorry, I am just trying to wrap my head around whether this is a good investment or not.

Sorry for my bad math. If private shares is 30% , you are somewhat getting something like extra protection with 7:3 ratio (ie. for every public share, you get extra ~0.43 share that helps to pay your principal back). then instead of buying at 0.0016, it's more like 0.0016/1.43 (initially before private investors get paid). that's close to 0.0012/share? that sounds like a steal to me. or am I smoking crack?

i don't think Icedrill has miners protection program (since it was not stated anywhere) but I think this 'credit enhancement" is way better than miners protection program. What's the point of hosting more hardware if hosting cost would not operationally break even?

(...)
Does HF's "Miner protection plan" apply to IceDrill?   If so, that may help, since 10Mh/s could end up about 50Mh/s if the ROI is bad.

Good question. Even if it did, what's the time-frame on receiving those extra chips? Weeks? Months?

I believe IceDrill has Miner Protection.

If they don't make 100% ROI within 3 months. November - December - January, then they will give them up to double or four times as many chips as originally purchased in order to make their ROI. It will only be chips though.

That combined with shareholders getting paid 0.0016/share before private investors should make this a fairly safe bet (If you trust DeaDTerra and HashFast)

It's going to be a long wait though!
newbie
Activity: 25
Merit: 0
Look longer term toward the cumalitive payout of dividends.  This should be a winner in that respect! If you're looking for quick flip or instant arbitrage In the next few months... Well thats debatable based on the information given.
sr. member
Activity: 245
Merit: 250

You should find another exchange that doesn't require the user to use some experimental buggy exchange service.

I went to sign up to bitfunder to purchase a few shares who required me to sign up to some weexcahnge site. When i went to sign up there I recieved this warning.

Quote
!!!!! ATTENTION !!!!!

THIS SITE IS IN BETA DEVELOPMENT AND MAY BE PRONE TO ERRORS.

Due to unforeseen circumstances database rollbacks may happen.
All information is kept private. We do not share it with anyone.

PROTECT YOUR ACCOUNT LOGIN INFORMATION.
We are not responsible if someone can access the account.
We highly suggest you use advanced authentication methods such as GPG.

The owners of the site obviously don't trust the software, so why should the users?



Not exactly disagreeing with you about the weexchange process (haven't bothered myself), but from btct.co's site:
"This site is currently in beta. Nothing is verified. Everything is virtual. Do your homework. Watch out for scams. Be diligent."
Which I suppose there's something to be said about how they come across differently about a similar message.
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