HPI being sold - Bad? Or good?

[Rooky]

I agree. I hope it is. From what I read, the only bad I see is those of us that aren't as inclined to embrace change will say "never heard of em, they're gonna ruin it, I ain't buyin." Which at first seems logical, apart from the fact that RipMax has been around far longer than HPI, and simply because the general population here in the US have never heard of them, doesn't mean diddly. Most of the general public has never heard of, for example, Luber Finer, roughly 30% of the oil filters on the shelf at your local parts house are made by them. Or any other number of things you use every day that you have no idea who manufactured or distributed. By the same line of thinking, most of the public hates big trucks (semis) with a passion, yet would have nothing without them.

My 2 cents, fellas, and as such means exactly. .. well ya know.

 

[Jam Racing 1]

I am sure RIPMAX will do the right thing and the transition will be smooth and hardly noticed.....

 

[Servohead]

As one that works for Volvo cars of North America, I need to offer some encouragement where our company a few years ago was purchased by an extremely wealthy company in China by the name of Geely.
So the rumors were numerous and negative and all of us worried that the cars would be deminished in quality. Today everything is going extremely well for the brand and all the negative worries were silly.
Of course we can't say this is always the case, but we can always hope for the best.
Secondly, they are only model trucks in the end and if HPI crashes under new ownership we all, I am quite sure, have bigger fish to fry. However, it's always nice to have parts available and hobbies to look forward to.

 

[X]

As with any change, wait and see what results. There is no use worrying over what MIGHT be.

 

[Wilson]

I am Ok with it, in the end theres not much we can do about it anyway. There is still a long road ahead, hpi was bought out for a reason so hopefully whatever issues there was with hpi they will be addressed and the company can move on from there.

 

[hpicelery]

I agree with Wilson. Really, as long as I can keep getting parts for my XS and Franken-Savage then I'll be happy.

 

[madgadget_1]

Perhaps HPI founder had met his goals, pretty high standards imo, and felt the need to move on to more or less whatever life holds for him. I will tell you Ripmax is a substantial player in the UK and internationally as well. This has the opportunity to be another milestone in the evolution of HPI again (imo). I will tell you ripmax got me satisfaction years ago regarding a vigor carbon fiber canopy sold by one of it's resellers. Wasn't even their product but pressure from RM made them refund shipping and actual costs to me. So I'm a bit biased but if they'll do that for me it affords me optimism for the brand I favor for rc fun.

 

[hpicelery]

EDIT: IGNORE ALL OF THIS. It's just the button at the top right of the page that switches between HB only and all HPI (why is that a thing?) It dawned on me here:
https://www.hpisavageforum.com/threads/bad-or-good.15883/page-3#post-195904

Original post follows:

OK folks, just when I was about to stop worrying... I went to HPI's Web site and clicked "All Kits." Here's what I got:

http://hpiracing.world/en/all-kits

Only a handful of cars and buggies, and all HB. No HPI anything. No Savages, no Vorzas, no Wheely Kings, nothing. Even clicking on "discontinued kits" shows only HB stuff. It's like all of HPI's products have vanished from their own Web site. The Savage and other pages can still be found by searching, but why would they bury the existence of all those kits? That can't be good.

 

[X]

I see all the kits in that link, including all savages. Maybe it was getting updated?

 

[hpicelery]

Ok, that's super weird. I went back and clicked on my own link, and still no HPI stuff. I tried turning off all of my ad blocking and anti tracking stuff, same result.

I then fired up Microsoft Edge (was using Chrome before) and went to the same page. All the kits are there! That's really weird. Why would Chrome only be showing me HB stuff, while Edge is showing all the HPI stuff? Even the home page is different. The Chrome home page just shows ads for HB stuff, while the one I see in Edge shows the Venture, XL 2.0, and all that stuff.

 

[X]

I'm viewing on chrome currently with no issue. Must be something on your end.

 

[hpicelery]

I guess so. Sorry for the dumb post then.

 

[X]

I guess so. Sorry for the dumb post then.

There are no dumb posts.......wait....there is rcnut........ok. There are almost no dumb posts.

j/k nut, maybe.

 

[hpicelery]

All right, I figured it out. There's a button in the top right corner of the page that switches between "HB Only" and "All HPI" modes for some reason.

I must have accidentally clicked it at some point.

 

[X]

All right, I figured it out. There's a button in the top right corner of the page that switches between "HB Only" and "All HPI" modes for some reason.
View attachment 2119
I must have accidentally clicked it at some point.

Well, that's what you get for cruising the internet like you're Helen Keller!

 

[Rooky]

EDIT: IGNORE ALL OF THIS. It's apparently some kind of weird browser issue, because other folks still see all the kits, and I see them too when I use a different browser.

OK folks, just when I was about to stop worrying... I went to HPI's Web site and clicked "All Kits." Here's what I got:

http://hpiracing.world/en/all-kits

Only a handful of cars and buggies, and all HB. No HPI anything. No Savages, no Vorzas, no Wheely Kings, nothing. Even clicking on "discontinued kits" shows only HB stuff. It's like all of HPI's products have vanished from their own Web site. The Savage and other pages can still be found by searching, but why would they bury the existence of all those kits? That can't be good.

Nevermind. I need to not be using the interwebs like I'm Helen Keller.

 

[Caretaker109]

https://www.facebook.com/groups/195176023926133/permalink/903885966388465/

 

[X]

https://www.facebook.com/groups/195176023926133/permalink/903885966388465/

Point of this link? If there is a post in that link, we can't see it. It's a closed group.

 

[Caretaker109]

Oh sh*t, Sorry guys.

There is a post from Neil Smith. (TNS). We would love to see a source...

Quote:
So a few may like to know this...Traxxas sued HPI over their waterproof radiobox and won...HPI was unable to pay the lawsuit so Traxxas took over the companies stocks....this is why HPI was sold............The lawsuit was as bogus as Traxxas's engineering team so if you liked HPI be sure to forever boycott the Traxxas brand....Please pass this on to others in the RC community.......

 

[hpicelery]

That makes me angry. And I just bought a Revo... If I had known about this a little sooner I would have just waited for that ARRMA Nero.

Oh well. I guess I can just try to make all my replacement parts non-Traxxas.

 

[Rooky]

I'm still on the fence. I'm not savvy enough (or just too lazy) to dig around and try to see if it's true. As of yet, I've not seen any sources or proof that this is true or false. But I'm thinking if in fact Traxxas had "taken over stock" they wouldn't have let Ripmax buy the company.
On the other hand, I also wouldn't want my potential clientele to think I caused a company with the following of HPI's to know I caused their demise.

 

[hpicelery]

I found this thread about it from 2014:

http://www.ultimaterc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=215358

It contains a link to the actual complaint:

https://search.rpxcorp.com/litigation_documents/10971394

 

[Rooky]

Well that's interesting.

 

[Derekpike]

This is his reported "proof" that he posted. http://www.liverc.com/news/announcements/11745-DEVELOPING:_Traxxas_to_acquire_HPI_Racing?/

Doesn't seem credible to me as this is based on rumors as well, but he he hell bent on the fact he's right.

 

[Rooky]

And that article is almost 3 months old. And I'm betting that article had a lot to do with the early Traxxas/HPI rumors.

 

[Derekpike]

And that article is almost 3 months old. And I'm betting that article had a lot to do with the early Traxxas/HPI rumors.

Agreed. Another guy posted this in response.

 

[savage_ricky]

wonder how hpi will be affected by this if is true and if its going to stay the same or if changes are going to happen like

 

[Wilson]

Well that's interesting

 

[Servohead]

One of my favorite stores online is Dollar hobbyz. I inquired with them regarding the availability of HPI parts, they reported this from HPI/ripmax for some reassurance:

Elise (Dollar Hobbyz)

Jun 21, 11:40 COT

Hi Steve,

Thanks for reaching out. From the information we have from Ripmax/HPI, they have every intention of continuing the product line.

There are a few models/parts that are back ordered and not expected to be available until the end of the summer. The transition has slowed their inventory, but we have every intention of continuing to offer the parts as soon as they become available in the next weeks and months.

Please let us know if there is anything else we can do in the meantime.

Thanks,
Elise @ DH

Dollar Hobbyz Support

 

[madgadget_1]

Glad you asked that, I was wondering the same