Topic: Organizing a group buy for 50+ BFL 600 GH/s Monarch ASIC cards (Read 18730 times)

04 March 2014 - Monarch Update

Power & Performance better than expected
The initial power consumption numbers for Monarch are in and they're about 20% better than anticipated, meaning we expect the Monarch to consume 0.45W/GH at the chip level. This translates to about 300W per 600GH at the wall. Chip performance of all systems is as good as or better than predicted. To put this in perspective, this makes the Monarch chip nearly twice as power efficient as compared to our 28nm competition whose products operate between 0.9 and 1.0w per GH at the wall.

Chip Delay
The initial batch that we currently have in hand is not suitable to ship to customers. This is due to a problem in a top metal layer of the chip that prevents some engines from initializing when the chip is first powered on. (With ASIC design, there are a number of layers to a chip; most of those layers are in silicon, but the last few layers are in a special type of metal. Subsequent batches were held in wait just prior to the metal layers so that we could affect any necessary changes and proceed with chip production from that point, drastically reducing the time it takes to bring a new batch of chips to life.) The problem was positively identified and the fix is already in progress; however it will take approximately 5 weeks before we get packaged chips in hand, meaning the deployment of the Monarch will be delayed about 5 weeks from now. The specific date is still being determined, but I wanted to get an update out as soon as possible.

Refunds & Delay Compensation

Because of the delay, we're offering several different forms of compensation that vary based on order pricing and order date:

$4680 600GH Monarchs

Free performance upgrades
All customers who ordered 600GH Monarchs prior to the price decrease on November 28, 2013 will be upgraded to the Imperial Monarch product, which is a new, high performance version of the card. The Imperial Monarch will operate at 1 TH/s (+ / - 20%).

Six Month Refund or Double Shipment Guarantee
If you’ve been waiting in queue for six months or more, you qualify for either a full refund in USD, OR double the hardware you ordered. This latter option will come in the form of (a) first shipping you the new Imperial Monarch, giving you an expected 160-175% of your ordered hashrate, and then (b) an additional Standard 600 GH Monarch at the end of the queue, giving you another 100% hashrate boost, totaling an expected 250+% of your ordered hashrate once all products have shipped. (Note: Electing the refund cancels the Imperial Monarch upgrade offer in the first section above.)

50% off Voucher
If your paid order is less than 6 months old but you paid $4680 for your Monarch, you will instead receive an Imperial Monarch as described above, as well as a 50% off discount on an additional Standard Monarch at the end of the queue.

Full Price 300GH Monarchs
For 300GH Monarch orders, similar but slightly different offers will be extended. Customers will be contacted with specifics via email soon.

Mining By the GigaHash
If your Mining By the GH paid order is more than 6 months old, you will receive 2x the hashrate purchased.

Reduced Price Orders
Individual orders that are less than 6 months old and that paid for the reduced price 600GH or 300GH Monarch will likely not be delayed past the expected delivery date.

. Details specific to each of the above order categories will be communicated to eligible customers via email in the next few days. We hope everyone will remain in the order queue and take delivery of these extremely power-efficient, super-fast miners. But, cognizant of the feedback of our earlier 65nm customers, for those qualified buyers who desire a refund we will gladly issue you one.

Refunds will be issued in 30 to 45 days from the date of request of refund. Refunds will be in USD.




Least these guys are stepping up, and not being an embarrassment, like Black arrow

That's just in accurate information, go check KNC forums before you post.  They are saying Late Q2, and that's if there lucky, that's why there giving batch 1 orders, the "Option" of hosting, because they are delayed
Saying there going to deliver in March/April is hilarious

The problem with BFL pre-orders is that we know the cost, we know the hash rate, and we know the current difficulty.  Can anyone tell me when they will Really ship? (no), or what the difficulty will be at that time ?(no)

This is a very speculative investment, and the sad reality is that while it looks like the "deal of the century" at this time, when it ships it may not even be adequate.  When I finally got my jalapeno, it was not the "money printing" machine I thought it would be, and if would have waited and bought hardware at the time I physically received the jalapeno, it was equivalent to other solutions, not a"hell of a deal".

I happen to like BFL hardware, it's robust, looks clean and hi-tech (I know very subjective) and it seems to be bulletproof, but at the end of the day, we all buy the hardware to use it, so at the time I expect these to ship they will not be a stellar deal at all, and will probably have more cost effective competition available and in stock.

Nobody is arguing that things aren't delayed. The point I am making is that that thread is the only solid place for information related to monarch ship dates. Secondarily, posts by BFL members on their forums.

Common sense suggests that they probably ship mid march to mid april.

that official BFL thread is crazy.  I can't believe they still keep posting updates....BFL has no shame.  Why do people still keep placing orders with this company ?  to compound things all of the 1st folks that jumped in to preorder got backdoored by the huge price cut.  yes !   

There was an official timeline which has since changed/disappeared actually.

Slavix, is it too late to order a Monarch in this fabulous Group Buy ?  this thread has been comical.  BFL sucks fat donk d.

There doesn't need to be confusion or misinformation about Monarchs. The one and only place to look for the latest information is here:

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/4414-monarch-information.html

There isn't even an expected ship date, just some hopeful dates if things don't go wrong.

Haha.. I remember reading on a forum (from Josh I think, but perhaps someone else) that shipments were guaranteed to be out the door in mid-late January.

Already slipping. More. Although original ship date was March I believe, but they had been saying earlier until now.

The card is not released yet. First shippments are expected in early February. New orders are likely to ship in April, according to BFL.

Yeah my KNC vaporware is killing BTC right now, and Cointerra's is about to rape the network hashrate as well.

Cointerra actually has more production capability than KNC, so they could be bigger. Time will tell.

I have my KnC vaporware hashing away happily at 140 gh/s right now, so yeah I'd buy more "vaporware" from KnC considering no one comprehends English anymore.

Uh. No. I meant the Monarch. Which is why I asked the question in this thread.

I wish you all the best with your group buy, but I cannot support Butterfly Lab, given their track history with shipping.

My stuff was 5 months late, and I was one of the lucky ones. Others were not so fortunate.

Please realize that they will ship late, and you will be very frustrated, and your customers in this group buy will be very frustrated, and some will take out their frustration on you.

Caveat emptor (latin for buyer beware).

"These"? You mean KNC and Cointerra? The 3 TH/s Neptune from KNC is scheduled to ship in March / April 2014.
They say they will produce "only" 1500 of them.
Imagine 1500 of those 3 TH/s miners hitting the mining world BEFORE the first BFL monarchs ship.
The Monarch is going to be - yet again - OOA.

When are these "supposed" to "ship"?

The Jalapeno I ordered in April 2013 was delivered to me late November 2013. It was simply OOA (Obsolete on Arrival). When I ordered it in April, the math showed a decent profit running it. By the time I received it, it was pulling electricity (not to mention the fan noise) more than it is generating in revenue.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice...

And since we are on the topic of vaporware... I see a lot of miners dumping their hardware on eBay. Are they recouping their money to re-invest in pre-ordering (more vaporware) from KNC and Cointerra?

Does not mean that at all.

You know if they drop their prices close to the deadline, things are not good at their end!

Monarch Group Buy - another 8 Monarchs ordered today. Total ordered so far: 67

Last I heard BFL is getting their first chips on the 9th of January and starting to ship by end of January.

Are they shipping today? because it's the end of 2013 today.

Huge Price reduction on Monarchs!
BFL just dropped prices on Monarchs by more than half from $4,680 to $2,100. Our Monarch Group Buy also gets a discount.

Our new prices are:
Cards ordered:
1 --------- $1,900 (discount $200 or 9.52%) - $3.17/GH/s
2 --------- $1,875 (discount $225 or 10.71%) - $3.13/GH/s
3 to 5 ---- $1,850 (discount $250 or 11.90%) - $3.08/GH/s
6 to 10 -- $1,825 (discount $275 or 13.10%) - $3.04/GH/s
Over 10 - $1,800 (discount $300 or 14.29%) - $3.00/GH/s



Let me know if you want to order more Monarchs!

Placed another Monarch Group Buy order today. Total Monarchs ordered so far: 58

 Placed another Monarch Group Buy order. Total Monarchs ordered so far: 57

Thanks. I will keep it in mind.

Make sure he doesn't change the terms/conditions and shipping price, as he's been doing with some other orders lately, increasing the cost after the items have been paid for, and holding them for 'ransom' until the customers pay the extra costs.

Not trying to be a jerk, but this is beginning to happen to BFL orders in waves right now. Just a warning. And it will happen /after/ the item can't be cancelled.

Id say the same of you TBH, having 10 monarchs in preorder. Good luck with that.

Hi. Unfortunately, no I am still waiting to hear back from Dave. Will place our first order as soon as he is ready.

So did Dave get back to you in time?

You guys are nuts

 - Sept 20. Sent invoices out to all who sent me signed service agreements. Collecting payments due and upgrade orders.

- Sept 25. Funds are collected, all but one upgradable order have been transferred to my account. We are ready to place the order. I am currently waiting on Dave of BFL to resolve some website issues they are working on which are preventing processing of our big order. Dave promised to get back to me tomorrow with update on fixes. Will place the order as soon as Dave is ready to process it. Hopefully very soon now.

I can not use any vouchers for this group buy.

If you really going threw with this i can sell you my bfl account that, last time i checked last week, still has the 25% discount voucher... You can get better pricing than for 10+ cards... lets say, 5 btc?

Sent you a PM reply. You still have time to make it on our first order.

Hi, I sent you a PM with details of my potential commitment, have I missed the first round?

Thx

 - Sept 17. Service agreement document is ready. Sending out to all group participants who confirmed readiness to be on the first order. If I missed you somehow and you did not get an email with service agreement please let me know asap. Next steps are invoicing, collecting funds, then placing the order.

It's not that 600GH will be unprofitable in December-March..................it's that BFL WILL NOT ship by that timeframe.Maybe by June 2014........MAYBE  

They have been late with every one of thier products...FPGA-3-4 months,ASIC 65nm-6-10 months(maybe more).What makes you think they learned anything  

Best of luck guys....your gonna need it!!!!!!!!!!!!

bringing me back to my previously unanswered question, negative ROI / investors = ?

F BFL.

So did BFL tell you when your Monarch group buy will be shipped?  According to this new coindesk articles, Josh said a fast-track limited production run will product the chip in 24 days, and a limited number of initial orders will be shipped around mid-November, but the rest of the orders will start shipping late January or early February 2014?  In 2-3 months time, the hash rate will increase by 4-8 times, making the Monarch unprofitable.

http://www.coindesk.com/butterfly-labs-coo-responds-to-detractors-amid-company-struggles/

You are free to buy at retail and not participate in this group buy. However I explained their condition. Take or leave.

How is 30 cards a "heavy administrative burden" for a company to ship?

Even I can ship 30 manufactured cards to 30 addresses within a matter of a few hours...

F BFL

Our group will be placing regular orders, likely once a month and Butterfly Labs realizes that this is not just a one off, but a multi-order arrangement. We decided to start with the first order being less than 50 to make sure all the people who are ready to order get it done and people who have not confirmed yet will be on next order.

yes, you do not understand BFL work process. It is not just about labels. Anyway this is their condition and I will execute re-shipping to buyers in a timely manner.

They required a large number for group buy in, but suddenly they're ok with half that? Yeah, that does't sound desperate or anything.


That's odd honestly. While I don't understand their "management process", working out up to 50 shipping labels shouldn't be an issue.

That's absolute bullshit. Everybody knows that I was as big a defender against people trolling BFL as anybody, back when you could readily get a refund. The second they decided to unilaterally implement a "no refunds" policy, ex post facto, is when their remaining credibility went bad. They've still got 90%+ of their queue to ship, aren't putting a dent in it, and have decided that people aren't eligible for refunds. Fuck that shit. I'm not buying anything again from either Avalon or BFL that isn't on the shelf, and ready to ship same day. Period. You're a fool to pre-order more vaporware from BFL, based on their miserable past performance.

 - Sept 12. Spoke with Dave this morning. We are good to go! I am making last preparations on service agreement document and will soon start sending out invoices and service agreement to group buy participants. Stay tuned!

I have some good news. I spoke with Dave of Butterfly Labs this morning and even though we do not yet have 50 cards confirmed for the first order, he said it was ok for us to go ahead and get started with what we have so far. This means we can get started on placing our first order!

There is one condition though that I must make you aware of. When speaking with Dave on logistics of placing this order he made it clear that it would be a heavy administrative burden on them to ship our group buy order to multiple addresses. Our group buy order will have to be shipped to me to be reshipped to you or to the Seattle Data Center for hosting. I told Dave that this may be unattractive to some of our investors as they do not know me enough or trust me enough to handle their precious hardware. Dave said he will think about this issue further, but for now this is the only option.



Next step in our ordering process:

- Please confirm once again your readiness to order

- I will submit list of our orders to Dave of Butterfly Labs

- A BFL employee will contact you for confirmation if you are upgrading.

- I will send you invoices for the amounts due. I will be using Bitpay merchant tools. Same as Butterfly Labs.

- Once I have the funds collected from all participants, I will pay for our order and notify all participants.

negative roi / investors = ?

Working on a plan that may allow fractional participation.

I hope to be able to offer our group buy participants an option to order less than a whole Monarch card for fractional ownership.

A group participant would be able to order less than 100% of a Monarch card. One could order 10%, 50% or 25%. I think this will attract many more participants with current BFL pre-orders who want to upgrade, but do not want to spend much more money on a whole card.

This option would require Seattle Data Center hosting for the Monarch cards. Under agreement I have with the Data Center I am able to assign fractional payouts from each miner hosted.

I am working on a document describing the offer and will consult with a Law firm on details.


I would like to hear what you all think about this idea. Please do leave a reply and let me know. Thanks.

this is silly, if I was OP I would walk away now. All the group buys I ever participated with were first day preorders and organized in adance not after product was selling like crack in redlight district.

Change the subject to "Organizing a group buy for 50+ powerball tickets"

you'll have better odds.

+1

 you do realize how wrong this statement is.  bfl is rolling in cash bro.
 right now as I type there is 100 th in unknown hash power.  
bfl has built working mini rigs . and most likely they are hashing like mad just pulling in coins let and right.    I do agree with the rest of your assessment  to not buy the new gear from them.

One more thing if you are a april 2013 single purchaser + little single purchaser  + 1 5gh unit  at the new hi price this deal may work, do the math. you could convert 75-90gh of hash to 600gh of hash for almost $0

one single is 2500 one little single is  1250  1 5gh is 274 that is a 4024  credit  the card here is 4200 . the card on bfl is 4680 .  So if this is your order setup why not?

1. Prices that I posted are "Monarch Group Buy" prices I am able to offer as part of this group buy. These are NOT BFL prices.

2. You probably had a 25 % off voucher, that is why you got the price that you did.

1) Why do you sign a non disclosure agreement when you post the prices publicly in the forum??? Do you think BFL will not see this post?


2) No way these are institutional prices. I just ordered 10 and I got a price of 3536,40 USD per unit



Anyway the money is lost for sure, as they will ship earliest 2015 i assume :-)

I love this line... potential profit.  The sad part is they truly believe it.   Singles are shipping from July 4th, 11 days out from his order.

Unfortunately, the god's honest truth that you and so many others will refuse to accept is that you have made FAR more running your FPGA for the last year than you ever would have if BFL had shipped last October.  The sheer volume of orders placed before your July 15th upgrade would have caused you to be making less than $10 a day by the time you got your equipment.  What's that? BTC over $100?  You KNEW that would happen last December???  Bullshit.  Show me proof you held onto every single BTC you earned from December to March and didn't sell anything before the rocket took off.

Updated first post with pricing information.

I feel sorry for anyone who falls for this shit.

While you may be in the first few days.... My soul still weeps for you

Well, no risk no fun.

I just ordered 10.

 I'm sorry for your loss

Standard Shipping only? Not good.

I will watch with interest. I have several a few TH in preorders but this might be fun to participate in.

Lol you dont make any sense ...

no way there are that many stupid people to get this.
unless they are new and the phrase "there's a sucker born every minute" applies

Its called EclipseMC. Unless what I hear is true and Josh got fired.

Funny coincidence I watched that movie (DOWNFALL) just 2 days ago and I very well remember that scene.
HILARIOUS! Thank you for a good laugh.

I am not too worried about BFL running out of cash (from pre-orders), I am sure they are operating a huge mining farm, generating hundreds of BTCs every week for them.

For status updates see first post of this thread.

How do you ignore a whole thread? (rhetorical question)

Love it!

Sorry but, personally, I don't believe a word of it 

+1

Interesting to read all the hate

 I preordered 4 Monarchs in first hour of sale time upgrading my 6 Singles from Sept 15th 2012.

With ASICS as with any investment, you shouuld only invest what you can afford to loose or you will stress out, that said, everyone always got a full refund from them which is not too bad for investment going bad lol

Also, everyone I know who did 1st day preorders with BFL got their equipment and mined at least 600% return on their initial cost which is nothing to complain about dispite them loosing the race due to production mistakes.

If anything,this whole bfl adventure has taught me that you gotta be there day 1-5 or max first week of preorders or you can forget about ROI.

 Your group buy is too late now so forget about it.  
Look at how many ppl already upgraded their Minirigs and Singles orders. You are now going to be months behind in the queue while something like 10-20TH are ordered on 17 and about same 18th, also you gotta consider that most people are waiting for banks to open to make wire payment or scooping up btc now. I think the market move in BTC this weekend is due to ppl buying up BTC to pay for their orders as banks are closed on the weekend.
My point is if you didnt buy it form them already then forget it  

PLANNED...

it wont be delivered until 2015 and it will use 305 watts at maybe 250ghash/sec, which by that point will probably be like the asicminer usbs today

either you're an idiot, drunk, or high as fuck.

 

2012 sorry. I am 21. This is a good fraction of my lifetime..

July 15th 2012 or 2013? Though I assume the prior - 2012

Dude please don't give them any of your money. I have 2 SC orders from July 15 2012. Still waiting. I have lost so much potential profit. They don't give an eff about us.

lol good stuff

When you have some cards in hand -- please contact me. I will take one if the market is still of a state that the product would make sense -- to me.

CIH-ONS

Punchline is in the video in my signature.

BFL is now out of money from all of the pre-orders they took for the last ASICs. This will be the boost they need to keep running and producing all of the old orders. They are a joke and I am almost at the point of telling them to keep the 3 fuckin singles I ordered and talked to Dave the same guy offering discounts on orders of 50+ and was assured NO LATER than July 31st. Now I am given an offer to retract my order on their terms of extending out for another pre-order???WTF?? So wait a minute they can cancel my order but I cant?? I dislike them very much right now and I just hope you do not end up being the bad guy for taking a bunch of newbies money and waiting for years to get the product.

yes, this post is a joke - bfl probably  bought OPs account.
nothing regarding BFL and buying anything from them can be taken seriously.

i wouldn't buy anything from them since their unofficial guarantee is that they'll fuck you and make fun of you.

this post is a joke right? i'm waiting for the punchline..

Considering BFL's past I think it's a slap in the face to offer pre-orders the 3rd time.

I do have orders with BFL (early single), and early jalapenos coming in the post.

I would avoid doing any business with them until they sort out their current backlog.

OMG you think by now he would get it...this has now been the 3rd time they've announced something that will be ready by christmas time in the same year...they want people to upgrade again and send more money...the orders they make could then be used to fulfill later units in queue.  If you really think its smart to drop what estimates to be over 600K on hardware then you should instead put your money on 10 TH Turnkey mining - DELIVERED RIGHT NOW not in "two weeks (tm)"

http://alydian.co/

Why would u pre order with BFL if you do you will get your pre order in 2015

Butterly labs is offering such good prices that even if they are late these cards will pay for themselves many times over.

For now!

And:

I am very serious and already have a few interested customers. I can not guarantee anything beyond what is promised by Butterfly Labs. However this offer is quite incredible and currently the best on the market.

Monarch cards list for $4680 for 600 GH/s that is 7.8 $/GH/s! Much better than any competition. With group buy we will get even better prices. PM me your email and number of cards you want to order and I will add you to our group buy list.

 Three questions.

 1) Are you serious ?
 2) Are you aware of Butterfly Labs' history with shipping schedules ?
 3) Are you high right now ?

 

That is yet unknown. I am going to contact BFL tomorrow to get more information. However description on BFL website mentions discounted pricing for orders of 50+ cards.

what kind of discount are they offering?

Hello all,
I am a bitcoin enthusiast, miner and trader. I trade on localbitcoins.com under profile https://localbitcoins.com/accounts/profile/bitcoinerS/
my email: [email protected]

I am organizing a group buy for Monarch cards to combine purchasing power and get better prices.


To join Monarch Group Buy or to sign up for Cryptomoon Hosting email me at [email protected] with your full name included and let me know if you have any questions and how many Monarchs you want to order.


Our orders so far:
Oct 4.   - 26
Oct 9.   - 12
Oct 18. - 3
Oct 21  - 4
Oct 23  - 8
Oct 25  - 3
Nov 6   - 1
Nov 26 - 1
Nov 29 - 1
Dec 30 - 8

Monarchs ordered: 67


Next order will likely be placed about 1-2 weeks after current one.



Since I signed an NDA with Butterfly Labs, I am not at liberty to discuss private BFL pricing information.
Retail price of one Monarch card is $2,196. Thanks to BFL institutional pricing discount I am able to offer these prices to our group.

Attention:
These are - "Monarch Group Buy" prices I am able to offer as part of this group buy. These are NOT BFL prices.

Pricing will depend on number of Monarch cards ordered. All group participants will benefit from participating in the group buy. Those who order more cards will get a bigger discount.

Cards ordered:
1 --------- $2,000 (discount $196 or 8.93%)
2 --------- $1,975 (discount $221 or 10.06%)
3 to 5 ---- $1,950 (discount $246 or 11.20%)
6 to 10 -- $1,925 (discount $271 or 12.34%)
Over 10 - $1,900 (discount $296 or 13.48%)



For convenience of managing this group buy I will have to restrict payment options to bitcoins, wire transfers and bank cash deposits. No credit cards, paypal etc. Nothing that has a risk of charge-backs.

Monarch Hosting prices
12 months prepaid
- $1,512 ($126 per month) - Butterfly Labs hosting
- $1,107.81 ($92.32 per month)* - Cryptomoon hosting

6 months prepaid
- $602.78 ($100.46 per month)* - Cryptomoon hosting

3 months prepaid
- $313.61 ($104.54 per month)* - Cryptomoon hosting

no prepayment (pay monthly in dollars or bitcoins)
- $108.61 per month* - Cryptomoon hosting

* Hosting - In addition to hosting provided by Butterfly Labs, I want to recommend an excellent option for hosting at a data center near Seattle - Cryptomoon Hosting. Our data center has access to some of the cheapest, hydro-power generated, electricity in the world and we are offering some of the best terms in the industry for managed co-location hosting. Your miners will run in a secure, insured, optimally cooled, fully managed environment. Ask me for more information if interested.

Cryptomoon Hosting Disclaimer: Monthly hosting estimate is based on the manufacturer’s public specification. Final monthly pricing will be based on the actual watts used. Prices are subject to change without prior notice.


To join Monarch Group Buy or to sign up for Cryptomoon Hosting email me at [email protected] with your full name included and let me know if you have any questions and how many Monarchs you want to order.



Project status and notes.
- Aug 18. Interest has been quite high and I already have expressed interest for 30+ cards after only one day of starting this group! At this rate I may be able to place our first group buy order in about a week or two, likely less. Go ahead and share this thread with others who may be interested.

- Aug 19. Spoke with Dave of Butterfly Labs. I will have to sign NDA to get information on institutional pricing. Sent him an email requesting NDA form to sign. Will continue discussion with Dave after NDA form is signed.

- Aug 20. Signed and emailed back the NDA form. Waiting to hear back from Dave.

- Aug 21. Spoke with Dave from Butterfly Labs. Everything is going quite well and Dave was very friendly and accommodating. I now have all the required information to go forward with this project.

- Aug 22.
I am planning to place first order as soon as we have close to 50 confirmations.

- Aug 26. Unfortunately many more people expressed interest in participating than actually confirmed readiness to order. So far I have confirmations for only 11 cards as some people backed out on fears over growing network difficulty and uncertainty over ROI. At this point we do not have required number of cards to place first order.
As soon as I have at least 40+ cards confirmed I will get started.

- Aug. 28. Answering a question that gets frequently asked - Can I combine orders for upgrade? - YES. We will be combining and upgrading multiple Butterfly Labs pre-orders when placing our group buy order. I checked with Dave of Butterfly Labs and got an OK.

- Sept. 3. Working on a plan that may allow fractional participation. I hope to be able to offer group buy participants an option to order less than a whole Monarch card for a fractional ownership. This option would require Seattle Data Center hosting. I am working on a document describing the offer and will consult with a Law firm on details.

- Sept 4. I have some good news. I spoke with Dave of Butterfly Labs this morning and even though we do not yet have 50 cards confirmed for the first order, he said it was ok for us to go ahead and get started with what we have so far. This means we can get started on placing our first order!

There is one condition though that I must make you aware of. When speaking with Dave on logistics of placing this order he made it clear that it would be a heavy administrative burden on them to ship our group buy order to multiple addresses. Our group buy order will have to be shipped to me to be reshipped to you or to the Seattle Data Center for hosting. I told Dave that this may be unattractive to some of our investors as they do not know me enough or trust me enough to handle their precious hardware. Dave said he will think about this issue further, but for now this is the only option.

- Sept. 7 I am preparing an option to group participants to order LESS THAN A WHOLE Monarch card. One could order a fraction of a card for a fractional share of the bitcoins produced.


I think this will be attractive to many BFL customers with existing pre-orders who can opt to upgrade WITHOUT SPENDING ANY MORE MONEY. Depending on when one placed an order with BFL and what prices were at the time, an upgrade to a partial Monarch would bring an increase in hashing power of about 3-6 times. I was advised by my lawyer to remove text advertising this option for now, before it is ready. I am currently putting together a document detailing this option.

- Sept. 11. OK. Service agreement document I have been working on with an attorney is almost ready. Today I am planning to talk to Dave and set our first order process in motion.

- Sept 12. Spoke with Dave this morning. We are good to go! I am making last preparations on service agreement document and will soon start sending out invoices and service agreement to group buy participants. Stay tuned!

- Sept 16. Almost done.

- Sept 17. Service agreement document is ready. Sending out to all group participants who confirmed readiness to be on the first order. If I missed you somehow and you did not get an email with service agreement please let me know asap. Next steps are invoicing, collecting funds, then placing the order.

- Sept 20. Sent invoices out to all who sent me signed service agreements. Collecting payments due and upgrade orders.

- Sept 25. Funds are collected, all but one upgradable order have been transferred to my account. We are ready to place the order. I am currently waiting on Dave of BFL to resolve some website issues they are working on which are preventing processing of our big order. Dave promised to get back to me tomorrow with update on fixes. Will place the order as soon as Dave is ready to process it. Hopefully very soon now.

Sept 26. Still waiting to hear back from Dave..

Sept 27. Unfortunately despite numerous attempts to get in touch with Dave, I am yet to succeed. Waiting to hear back from BFL to place the order.. Getting a bit annoyed by the delay.

Oct 1. Doing my best to place the order asap. Calling, emailing and messaging BFL daily to get someone to help place the order already! Quite annoyed at this point by the long delay. BFL_Jody promised to follow up with me tomorrow morning after I sent her a PM.

Oct 2. Got a response from BFL. They are still working on website feature that would allow merging multiple current pre-orders into one new order. This is what has been preventing us from placing the order so far. No eta from Dave yet..

Oct 3. Got a call today from Paul of BFL. Starting the order placing process. Sent him a spreadsheet with a list of upgrade bound pre-orders. Waiting to hear back from Paul with invoice.

Oct 4. Great news! Our first order for 26 Monarchs has been placed. I am quite exited and relieved to have completed this phase of the project.

Oct 9. Second order for 12 Monarchs placed.

Oct 18. Another order for 3 Monarchs placed.

Oct 21. 4 more Monarchs ordered.

Oct 23. 8 Monarchs ordered.

Oct 25. 3 Monarchs ordered.

Nov 6. 1 Monarch ordered.

Nov 26. 1 Monarch ordered.

Dec 30. Another 8 Monarchs ordered.