Adafruit interviews Siemens re SupplyFrame, the future of Hackaday, Tindie

This is a heartbreaking interview for anyone who loves Hackaday. That community is amazing and it's obvious Siemens doesn't properly appreciate it. It speaks volumes that they basically ignored every question about Hackaday. If you haven't listened to the Hackaday podcast it's truly a gem. Maybe the community could come together and pool resources to purchase itself from Siemens and spin off as a nonprofit?

&quot;Adafruit:<p>Hackaday.io hosts a variety of unusual projects. Will Siemens exert any content restrictions over independent creators there? Will Siemens provide staff to care for and manage the Hackaday community?<p>Siemens:<p>Siemens did not respond to this question.&quot;<p>Yikes!<p>Hackaday staff should register hackevery24hours.com to start a new site when Siemens eventually destroys the original.

Kinda think Adafruit screwed this one up by virtue of their timing.<p>If it’s still a “planned acquisition” you can bet your ass nobody is going to say anything substantial about real plans, synergies, changes or well anything really.<p>Of course you’re gonna get a bunch of PR bullshit and “no comments”. The other comments here interpreting this as Siemens not knowing what they’re doing &#x2F; it being a warning sign misses the mark.

WTF does Supplyframe actually do?<p>Various bits from their website [1]:<p>&gt; Only Supplyframe’s Design-To-Source Intelligence (DSI) solutions deliver actionable insights that drive better decisions across new product development initiatives, full product lifecycles, and strategic sourcing of direct materials.<p>&gt; DSI Network: Unmatched electronics industry parts &amp; design cycle data<p>&gt; DSI Platform: Industrial-scale intelligence platform<p>&gt; DSI Solutions: Transformational, AI-based solutions<p>Notably, they own findchips.com and componentsearchengine.com.<p>Is it really just &quot;we have a bunch of websites and collect and present all sorts of information about chips&quot;? Who pays for that? How on earth does that translate into $70 million in revenue?<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;supplyframe.com&#x2F;why-supplyframe&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;supplyframe.com&#x2F;why-supplyframe&#x2F;</a>

Just in case, one of the Ada fruit higher ups (mr lady ada?) is Phillip Torrone who founded hackaday. Although he’s not at hackaday anymore his statement at the end of the interview explains some of the interest in the takeover:<p>“ Adafruit: Seventeen years ago, I started Hackaday, the site, the mission, and designed the logo that is still in use today; please take good care of it – the SupplyFrame folks did a pretty good job. This is not a question – pt”

Siemens seems like it does not know what it had acquired or who they are speaking to. Basically a bunch of PR gobbledygook that answered very little.

To those accusing Siemens Of not properly appreciating hackaday (which I loved in the past as well) consider this from Siemens point of view:<p>They are spending $700M on a digital parts intelligence company. This is 10x revenue, so there is serious growth or other significant opportunities that justify that multiple.<p>A hacker&#x2F;maker news site and forums that the company also happens to own that generates, maybe, a few million? Which certainly doesn’t have a growth rate justifying a 10x valuation? These are minor aspects of the deal and frankly just not a high priority to the M&amp;A team trying to plan and execute the integration of a $700M acquisition.<p>Should the corporate communications team or PR agency advising them have done a better job on this interview? Sure. But Seimens is focusing on exactly what they should be focusing on and that simply is not a niche hacker&#x2F;maker community website.

TLDR:<p>&gt;adafruit: Hackaday?<p>&gt;Siemens: WTF is Hackaday?

Hackaday was one of the website I visited voluntarily.