Dear Neo900 supporter,
we would like to update you on the current project status and on how to move forward. Please read this entire mail, because some actions are required on your part. These are the topics we cover:
- heads-up: weak Euro affects total cost,
- brief status update and start of materials purchase,
- shop opens for pre-orders,
- expect a voucher for your loan.
We have completed most of the design of the subsystems of Neo900, and we have tested some critical components. For details, please follow the links on http://neo900.org/resources
As a result, we now know which major components we will want to use, and we have estimates of whether these components are likely to be easy to find when we go to production, or whether obtaining them could become a problem.
The best way to avoid such future problems is to buy "risky" parts early. To do all this, we need to ask you for a down payment.
We have set up a shop where you will be able to pre-order your NeoN board or Neo900 device, and where you can make the down payment. A timely pre-order is especially important if you wish to order a Neo900 device since we will need to order scarce N900 materials for them.
We will send you the shop URL with your voucher, see below.
We have also updated the FAQ (http://neo900.org/faq) and we have added an updated estimate of the total cost of the product: http://neo900.org/estimate
You will notice that it is higher than what was estimated earlier in the project. This is in part due to the project turning out to be more complex than expected, but mainly because the Euro has depreciated dramatically with respect to the US dollar. This affects virtually all component prices, which are usually expressed in US dollars, and also various other costs.
We have written a more detailed analysis here: http://neo900.org/exchange
We apologize for not notifying you of this increase earlier, but, truth be told, we did not become aware of the full magnitude of the change until we made the above cost calculation update. We're sorry about the price change this has caused, and realize that it may come as a shock to some, like it did to us.
To return to the pre-orders, the amount of the down payment depends on which product (NeoN board or Neo900 device) you choose, and how many. You can deduct the loans ("donations") you have made so far from the amount of the down payment.
For this purpose, we will send you a voucher (a code) that corresponds to past payments. We will mail out vouchers over the next few days. We do this gradually, so that we won't be overwhelmed if any issues pop up. We will also announce on http://neo900.org/ when we have sent all the vouchers (this should take about a week).
We thank you for your continued support and we keep on being amazed by the enthusiasm in this community !
Thank you !
– The Neo900 team