Excellent choice
Can you tell us a bit more about the "fun"? Was Novatac in financial difficulties, or just Joe who was looking for more and more money or something?
NT was hurting. Remember, the only engineer that knew the light, was gone, and so any improvements on the light was not going to happen. They hired another engineer in CA, but since no improvements were made, I highly doubt that he understood the complexities of the light. I had only met that engineer once, and my views may be a bit biased, but I felt he would rather be surfing than attempting to fix issues.
We had 4 calibrators and machines to program the light. 2 of these went down with no one to fix them. You can imagine what that did to production. Had trays of lights that had failed final inspection on the integrating sphere, and I would swap LEDs on these then they would need to go through the calibration and sphere testing again. Several had heat sink issues which we were trying to resolve to save the fallout. Did I mention I was anal? If the light didn't perform to satisfaction in any way, it went in the ever larger growing pile of fallout.
IMHO, the light went to market too quickly. I understand from a business aspect that one can not run a company on vaperware while the light is being engineered, but also there were problems that needed to be sorted out. My best guess is we had about 25% fallout, which just doesn't work from a business aspect.
I can't speak with what happened after they moved to CA, but I doubt things got much better. The company was run with investor capital, most from Joe, but there were other investors as well.
Behind the scenes, NT was struggling.
Henry went on to make Ra lights until he got use of his name, HDS, back. This is were we saw the twisty's come into play.
Then lawsuits entailed where no one except the attorneys came out ahead. These were not initiated by Henry.
Truth be told, I see both of sides of this all too well. Companies need a good product to deliver, and time is money. You can have it fast, good, and cheap... pick any two. Henry's philosophy is to make the best light possible, and as we all know from some of the wait times endured in waiting for the lights, they don't come fast. This doesn't work well in a business model that includes investors, employees, building rent, etc. etc. where the company is bleeding on a daily basis. NT went to market too quickly, and suffered as a result.
Henry is also the most brilliant engineer I have ever met, and completely anal retentive. As an example, I was picking up a High CRI the other day for myself. It was MY light. For me. Not to be resold but to have a place on my belt. Henry knew this and insisted on putting it in a package and making sure the packaging had High Cri written on it even when I told him not to bother. LOL! From a business aspect, it's great for the consumer, but as a business model, speed of getting to market must play into it.
If we look at another famous flashlight company, they have vaporware at every SHOT Show. Lights that never make it into production, but they can rely on their name, advertising, and a line of lights already on the market so cash flow is not an issue, though it annoys several consumers wanting a light that is said to be coming out, that never does.
Another thing other manufacturers tend to do is come out with new lights all time so that folks will "upgrade" to the new model. This works. Flashaholics are quick to look at lumen levels or a new design and purchase the new lights, when the real benefit is pretty minor. While this makes for a good business plan, it just isn't how HDS operates.