How did today's Avid business news affect the Eleven Rack, if at all?

[moff]

Originally Posted by texasdave

...Wish me, #Elevenrack, #M-Audio and #ProTools luck.

The tweet is a bit confusing. According to the news release, Avid is keeping ProTools and ditching M-Audio, so why the tweet includes both seems a bit odd. OTOH, we don't know if "#Elevenrack, #M-Audio, and #Protools" refers to product names, or Twitter screen names for Avid employees who have been terminated?

I think we're safe, in that they're keeping the line of ProTools hardware like Fast Track and M-Box. ElevenRack is another piece of ProTools hardware - or at least a PT interface. Still, if Akai's parent company DOES take over the ElevenRack, we may see some improvement in response to user requests.

But remember, regardless of who owns ElevenRack, whether or not the product stays or goes, or even gets deleted, it doesn't render our existing 11s unusable. Unfortunately, some may feel the need to bail out.

[orangecountycarl]

Originally Posted by moff

But remember, regardless of who owns ElevenRack, whether or not the product stays or goes, or even gets deleted, it doesn't render our existing 11s unusable. Unfortunately, some may feel the need to bail out.

The only place to bail is AXE-FX II at 3x's the price and 10x's the complexity.

I don't plan on going anywhere for the present.

[Str@man]

A little scarey to hear guy's;

Now about that Stand Alone Thingy that I may have mentioned once or twice....

[texasdave]

Originally Posted by moff

The tweet is a bit confusing. According to the news release, Avid is keeping ProTools and ditching M-Audio, so why the tweet includes both seems a bit odd. OTOH, we don't know if "#Elevenrack, #M-Audio, and #Protools" refers to product names, or Twitter screen names for Avid employees who have been terminated?

I wouldn't make it more cryptic than it is... He's used the #hashtags above before, and most of his tweets were related to his work on those products, so to include them in an "I'm changing jobs" would be normal... He seemed to have a lot of enthusiasm for the Eleven Rack... I could guess that we lost an employee advocate for the product, but again, I'd rather someone smarter than me fill in the blanks.

But don't worry, per the investor presentation today, "Customer success remains our top priority"

Texasdave

[moff]

Originally Posted by texasdave

I wouldn't make it more cryptic than it is... He's used the #hashtags above before, and most of his tweets were related to his work on those products, so to include them in an "I'm changing jobs" would be normal... He seemed to have a lot of enthusiasm for the Eleven Rack... I could guess that we lost an employee advocate for the product, but again, I'd rather someone smarter than me fill in the blanks.

Texasdave

It's still odd that he asks to say good luck both to the product Avid is definitely keeping (ProTools) and to the product they're definitely dumping (M-Audio), in the same sentence. Does he not know what's staying or going?

We know his tweet is erroneous in at least one aspect (ProTools), so might it be erroneous in two (ElevenRack)?

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by texasdave

I wouldn't make it more cryptic than it is... He's used the #hashtags above before, and most of his tweets were related to his work on those products, so to include them in an "I'm changing jobs" would be normal... He seemed to have a lot of enthusiasm for the Eleven Rack... I could guess that we lost an employee advocate for the product, but again, I'd rather someone smarter than me fill in the blanks.

Texasdave

It's not precisely clear what he meant. Hiro was at least at one time the Eleven Rack product manager, and as I understand very involved in getting the product out the door and so probably unfair to just label him just as 'an advocate'.

Now key questions are --

Is the Eleven Rack product line following Hiro or staying at Avid? (its just unclear).

Then my next question was going to be is Chris Townsend staying at Avid or following the Eleven Rack if indeed it is leaving? I'd hate to see the Eleven Rack cut off from Chris' obvious DSP/modelling talents..... Oops but I just noted that Chris' linked-in page lists himself as an Audio Consultant at his own consulting company (Full Code Audio), and has for a few months. Now he may well be already or will end up consulting for Avid (and/or wherever else the Eleven Rack ends up) for all we know. And those same DSP talents may be in demand in AAX work at Avid.

I was/am hoping the Eleven Rack would stay with Avid, but I'm not very confident of that. I could also see Avid deciding that Fractal is too much competition at the higher-end and just not wanting to invest in this when they need to focus on everything related to AAX and Pro Tools 11/64 bits.

What happens to the Eleven plug ins? Where do they go? (I've always hoped they would be synced up with the expansion pack and ported to AAX native and DSP).

Lots of product roadmap questions for all the above then flow, but its way too early to get into that.

I know its hard, I've been though companies struggling with layoffs etc. but Avid is really awful at communications and PR/AR, all this stuff could just have been laid out more cleanly, with specifics of the product lines and some obvious questions preempted.

If it does turn out Chris is not involved with the Eleven Rack anymore, I'll probably end up ordering an Axe FX II (Fractals' product wait list issues seem a lot less of a problem now).

Darryl

[texasdave]

If I had to guess, I'd say he was a bit shell-shocked to find he had a new employer today...

Just listened to the investor conference call and (analyst) Q&A:

Chief Operating Officer is leaving, and if I understood correctly VP of Finance. CEO will take over COO position at least for a time. This move impacts about 350 employees (out of about 2000 "full-time equivalent,") some of which will be picked up by inmusicbrands as part of the divestiture. The phrase in the conference call was "anything that is Protools Advantaged" will stay with Protools.... for example, most of M-Audio is going, but sounds like Fast Track will become Avid.

Didn't find much else to glean from the investor conference call, at least as it relates to 11R.

Texasdave

[texasdave]

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

It's not precisely clear what he meant. Hiro was at least at one time the Eleven Rack product manager, and as I understand very involved in getting the product out the door and so probably unfair to just label him just as 'an advocate'.

Now key questions are --

Is the Eleven Rack product line following Hiro or staying at Avid? (its just unclear).


Darryl

Based on what I gleaned from the conference call, 11R stays Avid, and Hiro is gone. Certainly no disrespect intended for Hiro; I believe he had a deep passion for the product.

Texasdave

[moff]

It seems that we may be getting excited over nothing. M-Audio is really the only "division" Avid's getting rid of, and wasn't it a relatively recent acquisition (in the last 5 or so years)? If so, maybe they decided it wasn't a good fit after all...

[dawnsman1]

Maybe the tweet means this:

"Good luck to those products moving ahead since so many talented people were laid off."

It may be a conspiracy!