When will Butterfly Labs (BFL) run out of money?

Viceroy

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Quote from: bassclef on May 14, 2013, 12:26:43 AM

I just read about the CEO of Butterfly Labs being a convicted felon, pleading guilty to mail fraud of over $20 million.

What's worse, he strung his victims along by mailing some of them checks. The vast majority, however, lost money. See any correlation?

You've got to be kidding me with this company.

edit: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/re-butterfly-labs-ceo-25-million-usd-mail-fraud-a-concise-summary-of-evidence-110805

Here's the latest summary in that post:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=110805.640

Xian01

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Christian Antkow

When BFL is firing and forcing refunds on their publicly vocal and frustrated early customers, it could be argued something is fundamentally amiss and should raise a red flag.

cdog

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It is indeed, "redicilous" Shocked

Lauda

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Terminated.

The story of this company seems more and more redicilous.

Knecke

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Schrankwand

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From the BFL Forum:

Quote

We are having some trouble with the new Single board and we are working through the issues now and should hopefully have a a resolution before the end of the week. Right now, the board is having trouble powering up the second bank of chips, so we are poking and prodding to figure out where the problem is and get it corrected. When we make a change to a board, we can have a revised board the next day, so it doesn't really set things back when we make revisions to an already existing board.

Viceroy

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link it.

bassclef

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I just read about the CEO of Butterfly Labs being a convicted felon, pleading guilty to mail fraud of over $20 million.

What's worse, he strung his victims along by mailing some of them checks. The vast majority, however, lost money. See any correlation?

You've got to be kidding me with this company.

edit: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/re-butterfly-labs-ceo-25-million-usd-mail-fraud-a-concise-summary-of-evidence-110805

RandyFolds

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In before all the BFL devices shipped thus far are just frankensteined Avalons.

Operatr

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www.DonateMedia.org

Quote from: smoothie on May 12, 2013, 06:27:09 PM

Quote from: Frizz23 on May 11, 2013, 07:44:24 PM

Quote from: jhansen858 on May 11, 2013, 06:54:34 PM

Please describe the ASIC design process in detail and the associated costs? I would like to learn how you can burn through several million dollars in a few months.

Oh that's quite simple: Just ask them BFL Cowboys how they did it.

- always blindly trust your subcontractors
- do no Project Management at all
- waste money on (unnecessary) bullet runs
- go mass production (50.000 chips), then do a prototype, then figure out your design is borked, then redesign, ...
- make tons of boxes with fans, that you can all throw away because your devices need much bigger casings (because of heat issues)
- and the list goes on and on ...

Seriously dude, just ask BFL how to get from one big fail to the next big fail. And the next. And the next ...

Just this alone should deter any new customer from ordering with BFL.

Obviously they have no common sense when it comes to designing, prototyping, testing anything.

1. Build a ton of shit you think you will need.

2. Find out you dont need it anymore because your product is too fucking big.

3. Repeat 1 & 2.

So funny because Josh even eluded/hinted that they had a prototype in November of 2012 that was going to get FCC stamp of approval etc.

And to this day only < 40 Jally's shipped.

More delays, excuses.

I just noticed that if you look at my history of postings from January you will see that it was BLATANTLY obvious that BFL could not and would not be shipping anywhere near their estimates.

Exactly. They sold vaporware knowing full well their product was neither fully designed or tested, which prompted a last minute redesign at our collective expense. Pretty fraudulent if you ask me to sell what you don't have for a year. Everything they do is sideways and unclear. I even started a "you suck" thread over there because apparently I can't even change my shipping address without sending a request to their customer service black hole, which has so far been 3 weeks ago now. Unbelievable.

Very, very amateur at best.

smoothie

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LEALANA Bitcoin Grim Reaper

Quote from: Frizz23 on May 11, 2013, 07:44:24 PM

Quote from: jhansen858 on May 11, 2013, 06:54:34 PM

Please describe the ASIC design process in detail and the associated costs? I would like to learn how you can burn through several million dollars in a few months.

Oh that's quite simple: Just ask them BFL Cowboys how they did it.

- always blindly trust your subcontractors
- do no Project Management at all
- waste money on (unnecessary) bullet runs
- go mass production (50.000 chips), then do a prototype, then figure out your design is borked, then redesign, ...
- make tons of boxes with fans, that you can all throw away because your devices need much bigger casings (because of heat issues)
- and the list goes on and on ...

Seriously dude, just ask BFL how to get from one big fail to the next big fail. And the next. And the next ...

Just this alone should deter any new customer from ordering with BFL.

Obviously they have no common sense when it comes to designing, prototyping, testing anything.

1. Build a ton of shit you think you will need.

2. Find out you dont need it anymore because your product is too fucking big.

3. Repeat 1 & 2.

So funny because Josh even eluded/hinted that they had a prototype in November of 2012 that was going to get FCC stamp of approval etc.

And to this day only < 40 Jally's shipped.

More delays, excuses.

I just noticed that if you look at my history of postings from January you will see that it was BLATANTLY obvious that BFL could not and would not be shipping anywhere near their estimates.

KS

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Quote from: Viceroy on May 11, 2013, 11:38:25 AM

well you do realize that creating an testing a 65 nm ASIC can consume millions of dollars pretty quickly, like within months, right?

And if they had to send stuff back (because they designed it poorly not because of manufacturer defect) that cost them a couple hundred grand right there. Yea?

That would be IF you're creating an ASIC.

Better business model: you create a front -> ship a few cheap parts -> pocket the millions -> pay some fake suppliers (you own, so you're just taking the cash) -> front goes bankrupt -> you = margaritas on the beach.

EDIT: you have to make it look legit though. Don't rush it, take a few months. As long as the money is coming in sufficient qty, keep going (milking).

bassclef

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Quote from: Viceroy on May 11, 2013, 07:20:57 PM

you can look that up on Wikipedia. estimates to produce a 65 nm ASIC easily run 2 to 5 million. if I had an rtl I could get the Avalon reproduced in less than six months, but that is not a very sophisticated chip.

Don't forget other business costs. Rent, salaries, accounting, employees, equipment, marketing, website.... the list goes on.

Frizz23

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Quote from: jhansen858 on May 11, 2013, 06:54:34 PM

Please describe the ASIC design process in detail and the associated costs? I would like to learn how you can burn through several million dollars in a few months.

Oh that's quite simple: Just ask them BFL Cowboys how they did it.

- always blindly trust your subcontractors
- do no Project Management at all
- waste money on (unnecessary) bullet runs
- go mass production (50.000 chips), then do a prototype, then figure out your design is borked, then redesign, ...
- make tons of boxes with fans, that you can all throw away because your devices need much bigger casings (because of heat issues)
- and the list goes on and on ...

Seriously dude, just ask BFL how to get from one big fail to the next big fail. And the next. And the next ...

Viceroy

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you can look that up on Wikipedia. estimates to produce a 65 nm ASIC easily run 2 to 5 million. if I had an rtl I could get the Avalon reproduced in less than six months, but that is not a very sophisticated chip.

jhansen858

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Please describe the ASIC design process in detail and the associated costs? I would like to learn how you can burn through several million dollars in a few months.

smoothie

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LEALANA Bitcoin Grim Reaper

Nope obviously he doesn't realize that.

All he sees is "Millions of $". Roll Eyes

Viceroy

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well you do realize that creating an testing a 65 nm ASIC can consume millions of dollars pretty quickly, like within months, right?

And if they had to send stuff back (because they designed it poorly not because of manufacturer defect) that cost them a couple hundred grand right there. Yea?

erk

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Quote from: Gator-hex on May 02, 2013, 05:23:13 PM

Avalon is 110nm

BFL was always been working on 65nm

This is the second time they've produced the ASICs, they already rejected the first batch because the ran too hot and then had them repackaged.
The old ASIC had a plastic package, the new one has a copper package to improve thermal conductivity.

We're now waiting for the second edition of the motherboard, the original one didn't have strong enough power regulators, to handle the chips unexpected power requirements. The old motherboard are still going to be used to produce the first batch of Bitforce 5's though.

It is worrying how hard they are advertising for new customers, the doubling of prices, the high order number 60k, and how few Bitforce 5's shipped from 6 wafers.

It looks like a company that needs more cash.

I doubt if BFL need cash, unless they have been bleeding it dry, they will have received several $million in pre-paid orders over the last 10mths.

hammurabi

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Price increase is probably to make folks think twice before ordering a refund.

Topic: When will Butterfly Labs (BFL) run out of money? (Read 12358 times)