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#1
02-04-2010, 01:38 PM
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Steve
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 *everything said above is just my opinion, and may or may not reflect the views of this BBS, its Operators, and its Members. If cornered on any “opinion” I post I will totally deny having ever said this in a Court of Law…Unless I am the right one*Some strive to be perfect.... I just strive. 
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#2
02-04-2010, 04:10 PM
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1. 7,220,018 which was filed on Dec 15, 2004 (and I now see it lists a PPA filed Dec. 15, 2003) and issued on May 22, 2007. 2. 7,473,008 filed March 22, 2007 which is the new continuation where they are now trying to claim all LED lighting even without a controller. 
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#3
02-04-2010, 04:46 PM
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ok so the first patent was applied for on dec 2003. the 2002 one was a supporting doccument. in there prior art statment they say there are many systems availble producing light capable of sustaining marine life, but none using LEDs as the light source. so that is a valid point.
one thing I have been wondering about is the anti trust laws pertaining to monopolies.. I think for them to get around this they would have to grant all licencing rights to companies willing to pay there fee. proving prior art in court seams to be the only way to bust this patent but.. it costs 180.00us just to file your prior art for them to concider and prior art has to be certified by a qualified inspector at the time. so pictures of systems over our tanks 10 years ago doesn't cut it. I would like to see this busted as much as anyone but I think that most big companies are just waiting for review years to see if they renew, or waiting till it expiers as it is to hard and very very expensive to fight a patent that is inplace. Steve
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*everything said above is just my opinion, and may or may not reflect the views of this BBS, its Operators, and its Members. If cornered on any “opinion” I post I will totally deny having ever said this in a Court of Law…Unless I am the right one*Some strive to be perfect.... I just strive. Last edited by StirCrazy; 02-04-2010 at 04:55 PM.
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#4
02-04-2010, 06:26 PM
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 ), not because it is a new and patentable idea.Apparently there are some moves afoot in the US for a third party submission to review the patent but it's not all public yet. It's tied into the recent request for prior art references on reefbuilders. There is some discussion of it on nano-reef as well. I'm happy to lend whatever support they need for that if I can. I think I should probably start a new thread for that later today when I have time...
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#5
02-04-2010, 07:56 PM
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they were using exhisting extrusions which cost them next to nothing, they were using off shore LEDs which are a fraction of the price of the cree. and they were driving them at lower levels which reduced the requirment for a heat sink. I would be willing to bet including labour there cost was under 500 bucks, and they probably sold the one unit to the stores for about 1700 and then the stores resold for about 2 to 2.5K If they wouldn't have had as many problems they did with the cheep LEDs burning out they would have made a killing, but they had to many warenty issues which ate into there profit a little to much. Steve
__________________
*everything said above is just my opinion, and may or may not reflect the views of this BBS, its Operators, and its Members. If cornered on any “opinion” I post I will totally deny having ever said this in a Court of Law…Unless I am the right one*Some strive to be perfect.... I just strive.
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#6
02-04-2010, 10:26 PM
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So I would be surprised if the cost of materials for a Solaris fixture was significantly less than that in 2006 even with their crappy excuses for heatsinks (which were probably responsible for the emitters burning out). now that also doesn't account for the R&D work to create a commercial fixture, tooling for bespoke parts if necessary, labour (even if it is cheap in China), shipping from China (not cheap), and any safety/electrical certification they required in North America. And then you have your operations cost in North America for offices, warehouses, staff etc. Now normal retail markup is 40% so if the retail was $3500 then the wholesale price from PFO was probably $2100. I don't think it is unusual for a manufacturer to have a markup of 100% over the cost of materials therefore I don't think the pricing was wildly out of line. You may want the manufacturers to have razor thin margins but they won't bother if they can't make any money.
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#7
02-04-2010, 11:15 PM
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the luxton stars were 1 watt leds, and at the time they were making the solaris they were cheeper than we can get the crees for, but that doesn't matter much.. what we get as a group buy is nothing compared to what a company can get things for. I know when I had my company going and I was looking at buying a significant quantity of something if I couldn't get it for about 1/3 of the retail price I would shop elsewhere. I never had to look around much. generaly I found there are 3 price ranges, retail, wholesale, and distrubitor. I am working on a deal right now that will get me distrubitor+ pricing on a produce that the rights to BA/AB with a few exclusions. nothing to do with the aquarium industry but the structure is the same. Basicly I know a guy who has the canadian distrubution rights to a line of products, he has a few avenues that he sells directly to in a specific industry. I can sell to any industry but the one he sells directly to and my cost is his cost plus 10%. when I sell to a company I am oblagated to sell at a lower price than if I sold directly to the public otherwise why would a company buy the product to resell. so lets pick a number of 100 bucks. I buy the product for 110.00 because of my deal, so for wholesale I sell at 180 to 200. for retail I would charge 280. with the group buys we are involved with in the diy fish tank things, we are dealing with retailers so the price we get is going to be better than if you go to a store and buy a product, but not anywhere near wholesale and distrubitor. now what would be ideal is if we had some one with a reg company that could contact cree sales directly and order a large volume. you would probably see the price down about 2 bucks a LED. same thing would apply to the heat sink, if I knew I would use 100 30X10 heat sinks, you could probably get at least 50% off the regular price and if you were to do some digging and find the smelter that actualy makes them and they are a generic die, not customer owned you could get them cheeper. at anyrate I digress. the company PFO makes it, sends it to there distrubitors and then the distrubitors sell to the stores so something that costs 3500 in the store probably cost the store about 2500-3000 (usaly less mark up on expensive stuff), would cost the distrubitor rep about 1500 to 2000, and the company about 700 to 1000. if there made off shore then you can cut that number way down. I am just pulling numbers out of my a$$ here, but the idea is that there are usaly 3 or 4 steps along the way and usaly each one of thoes steps is 50 to 100% mark up on pricy things, and more on cheep things. Steve
__________________
*everything said above is just my opinion, and may or may not reflect the views of this BBS, its Operators, and its Members. If cornered on any “opinion” I post I will totally deny having ever said this in a Court of Law…Unless I am the right one*Some strive to be perfect.... I just strive.
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