Bosch (Reaxx) Lost Suit to SawStop news

[Paul-in-Plymouth]

Steve N:

Steve Gass did not create the CPSC, but he would be a fool not to try to gain every legal advantage he can, including seeking a CPSC mandate, to help promote the success of his enterprise.  

I don’t know the man, but I have nothing but admiration for his creating a successful business based on his own invention.  Few people can do that, span the technical, legal and business worlds the way he has.   And I don’t think they achieve success by leaving legal opportunities for advantage on the table.  It’s too tough a world out there.

Personally, I have a wall-full of US patents myself.  Many of them are features of products that have seen billions of $$ in sales for the company I used to work for.  And it pleases me no end to see some of my inventions still in production more than a decade after my retirement.  

However, they were all created in the well-funded environment of some prosperous multi-billion-$ corporation while I drew a regular salary that bought the groceries, paid the mortgage and sent my kids to school.  I freely and gratefully accepted this “Nanny-State” solution - the security of a corporate lab - rather than trying to commercialize these things myself.  In fact it never even occurred to me to try on my own.  I simply would have had no clue of how to go about it.  And my family would most likely have starved on the streets if I had tried to take the “crash course.”  

So, I view Steve Gass’ accomplishment of creating a successful business from his own invention with more than a little awe, and I don't begrudge him playing some hardball to get there.  

I do not own a SS saw and rarely use a table saw anymore.  If I were in the market for a new saw, though, SS would be very high on the list.  If I anticipated employing someone to use my saw, I think I would have no other choice than SS.

[srv52761]

cap·i·tal·ism
 
ˈkapədlˌizəm/
noun
an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.
synonyms:         free enterprise, private enterprise, the free market; enterprise culture.
antonyms:         communism
....

I have been kibitzing this thread some.
I have no business background and little understanding of business models.
So I am very confused.
 
Using Steve’s definition and following discussion, I am trying to understand how this works. …… what I am left with. ….
1. Company A invests in research, development, prototyping, etc., and comes out with a product. 
2. This Company A gets a patent.
3. This product is then sold on the open market in such a way as to maximize a profit.  The price needs to include the cost of production, sales, marketing, research, development, and probably a myriad of other stuff I have no knowledge of.
4. If the population thinks the price is too high they will not purchase it.
 
Then Company B says I can make that product or a close approximation for less.  So Company B manufactures the product and determines a price.  But Company B does not have to include research and development (at least to the same degree), nor the basic manufacturing paradigm as that was spearheaded by Company A.  Therefore Company B will almost always be able to undercut Company A.  After Company A spent money for manufacturing plants, then undercut by Company B, we would have an empty Company A plant… and general marketing chaos.
 
But we have laws (and governments to enforce those laws) that will prohibit that. If not, then there would be no incentive to make new discoveries or spend the money on research and development, hire people, whatever else that’s involved with launching a product….
Our laws were designed to make sense of  free enterprise and prohibit this chaos.  Weren’t these laws enacted to make the free enterprise system flourish?
 
Gass is trying to avail himself to these laws to maximize his profit.  Isn’t that the basis of our free enterprise system?
Won’t the laws decide the extent of Gass’s marketing or if his actions complies with  the free enterprise system?   What am I missing?
 
As an aside, it may end up being a different part of the legal system that has the greatest impact on this, the lawyers of the insurance companies.  I heard a regional school district is dismantling their industrial tech depart in some of their schools and changing curriculum to CAD instead of hands-on.  In part because their insurance company’s lawyers suggested that since the technology is available, their liability in the event of an accident would be cost prohibitive if they do not incorporate it.

[Steve N]

Then Company B says I can make that product or a close approximation for less.  So Company B manufactures the product and determines a price.  But Company B does not have to include research and development (at least to the same degree), nor the basic manufacturing paradigm as that was spearheaded by Company A.  Therefore Company B will almost always be able to undercut Company A.  After Company A spent money for manufacturing plants, then undercut by Company B, we would have an empty Company A plant… and general marketing chaos.
 

You are of course making the assumption company B wants to add a finger Nanny to their saw, most of the manufacturers who have listened to market research from "woodworkers" not SS owners, have data that most do not want to pay a lot of money for a feature they do not feel is necessary to the operation of a TS. Gass is trying to force the gubmit, to force all of us who do not want a finger nanny to have to take one, or not be able to buy a new TS.

All I have asked for is one link to another company doing what Gass has tried to do via the CPSC, and I keep getting a bunch of answers to tell me how business works. I know how business works I don't require a primer, all I want is for somebody to show me a link of any company that used the government to try to give them a lock on an entire industry. It's been suggested more than once by my business instructors that it happens all the time. I'd just like to read about it, and all I get is crickets.

[kurt18947]

Actually...Gass IS giving the free market the choice and they seem to be overwhelmingly choosing the Saw Stop. Just try to find a used one--Delta, Powermatic, etc all available on CL but no SS. Why? Because people want them. The Market has spoken.

After his original gambit with the CPSC failed. If his company had taken their current course first, this thread and others like it wouldn't exist. The objection isn't to the machine, it is by most accounts a well designed and built machine. The objection is to his trying to force his invention down out collective throats.

[Admiral]

All I have asked for is one link to another company doing what Gass has tried to do via the CPSC, and I keep getting a bunch of answers to tell me how business works.  I know how business works I don't require a primer, all I want is for somebody to show me a link of any company that used the government to try to give them a lock on an entire industry. It's been suggested more than once by my business instructors that it happens all the time. I'd just like to read about it, and all I get is crickets.

Steve, and I mean this with all due respect (unless you are just trolling this topic and not interested in the merits), influencing regulators and regulations is a known business technique, to ignore it exists for the sole purpose of advancing the economic interests of the business spending the time and money to do so is to ignore reality.  I'm not going to change your mind, but continuing to maintain that the regulatory lobbying activity of SS is aberrant behavior is counter to the reality of how business in America works, for better or worse.  Companies spend money on lobbying to gain favorable regulatory treatment that would be in their commercial advantage, period, and it must work or they would not do so.  Here is a database specifically on CPSC lobbying, drawn from lobbyists' required publicly filed reports , which is widespread across many industries, and I am sure, for many different purposes.  Have fun googling, as I'm done with this, and done with pointing out what is patently obvious. 


https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/agencysum.php?id=046

Worth noting that Bosch spent $2.5 Million lobbying the CPSC in the last 5 years, and over $5.5 Million in the last 10. 

And the "Power Tool Institute" (and assuredly, SS is likely not a member, while Bosch clearly is) spent $1.275 Million in the last 10 years; what, perchance, do you think they were lobbying?  Immigration reform?  PTI clearly hates SS and is counter-lobbying.    http://www.powertoolinstitute.com/pti-pa...-facts.asp

[fixtureman]

[quote pid='7427813' dateline='1486298428']
Quote:Actually...Gass IS giving the free market the choice and they seem to be overwhelmingly choosing the Saw Stop. Just try to find a used one--Delta, Powermatic, etc all available on CL but no SS. Why? Because people want them. The Market has spoken.
[/quote]


That is a moot point.  If Sawstop had started making them in 1930 and had millions of units out there like the other saws there would be none to be bought.  I have past on a couple of Saw stops that people think the have gold and want almost as much as new.  There is another forum that I am on that the people think their machines will resell for 80 to 85 percent of new and claim just look at this other machine and they are selling them at a lower percentage but the other machine has 100 time more units out there to sell

[Downwindtracker2]

The plus of the SawStop is the low price of price of used Unisaws etc. If you are cheap and only want to order 9 beer at a time, so what. But employees should be given the chance to order 10.

[Steve N]

After his original gambit with the CPSC failed. If his company had taken their current course first, this thread and others like it wouldn't exist. The objection isn't to the machine, it is by most accounts a well designed and built machine. The objection is to his trying to force his invention down out collective throats.

Finally someone who understands. If you want a finger nanny, go for it. If not you should be free to choose. Gass is universally disliked because of his way of trying to promote his contraption.

[Steve N]

Admiral, the first link was lost on me. I see nothing specific about this very specific topic. However the second link by the PTI completely makes my points for me, with research, and a point by point discussion of everything wrong with SS's approach to marketing. If the CPSC looks at only the number of fingers data, and are ok siding with SS, then any product that can cause injury, or death needs to be immediately removed from the market, lest it cause injury to one more person. Even if no proof need be entered as to the actual cause of the injury. This isn't a gun industry thing where every day loaded guns go out and about shooting people without human interaction. This is a product that if used correctly, and with the guards provided is plenty safe. Injuries are caused when people do not act in a safe manner. I am not being a troll. I just find a company trying to use the government to take out their competition a vile thing. I still would like to see a case where someone else has done the Gass thing, especially with power tools.

[Tapper]

You are of course making the assumption company B wants to add a finger Nanny to their saw, most of the manufacturers who have listened to market research from "woodworkers" not SS owners, have data that most do not want to pay a lot of money for a feature they do not feel is necessary to the operation of a TS. Gass is trying to force the gubmit, to force all of us who do not want a finger nanny to have to take one, or not be able to buy a new TS.

All I have asked for is one link to another company doing what Gass has tried to do via the CPSC, and I keep getting a bunch of answers to tell me how business works.  I know how business works I don't require a primer, all I want is for somebody to show me a link of any company that used the government to try to give them a lock on an entire industry. It's been suggested more than once by my business instructors that it happens all the time. I'd just like to read about it, and all I get is crickets.

Finally someone who understands. If you want a finger nanny, go for it. If not you should be free to choose. Gass is universally disliked because of his way of trying to promote his contraption.

Sorry, but not true. Steve Gass is not "universally disliked." He worked is a$$ off to design, build and develop plants/sources to get this product to the market. It was HARD WORK, pure and simple. Then he had to get 30 investors to come up with $3 million in seed money and take a chance on him. Many on this board, including me, and throughout this country are very glad he made the effort and was successful.

It seems that lost on you and at least some others here, is that he was willing to negotiate with the current table saw manufacturers at the time to include his device on their saws for a "reasonable" fee. At first they engaged him and then after talking to their lawyers, got cold feet because they were told that if they did eventually include the device on their saws, they could possibly be liable for all the suits that were being brought against them for prior injuries on their saws. In the end, they decided to band together and go against him by refusing to further negotiate - they walked away from the table; it was basically collusion (against the law).

You give yourself away Steve when you keep using the pejorative "finger nanny" and therefore erode your argument. Surely you don't think that everyone who has bought this product has been bamboozled do you? Didnt' think so.

Doug

P.S. If you don't believe what I've said is true just Google it - the entire long story of this saga is on the net written by an impartial party. Just one of several.