ottoman

iTrader: (13)

Wow you must have inside info on XRays business plan.... I mean to know how much they sell on each continent... and how much they need to sell to stay in business.... pretty impressive.

ioxqq

tc3team: Xray will not put too much innovation in new product. Why, because if that works all the touring cars do not look alike now. Innovation is very risky in business especially in todays market. That's why Corally, Xray, 416, TC5 all look alike.
To come out a new version 2 times a year or every 2 years. This decision is not decided by Xray. It is depends on the market. If the market grows, they will do it for sure. Remember Xray here is not because of your racers. It is 100% that they want to get money from your pocket. If they can, they will. Plus, there is a cost on developing new kit. If market is bad now which it is really now. They will keep race the existing car in order to become more cost effective for their manufacturing cost.
Serpent S400 does not sell good. Serpent has no choice to keep running this car. Same reason as I just said.

Lonestar: Yes racer buys Xray. But do you know how small is the racing market. The racing market is big enough to support Xray. No way... unless Xray is monopoly. Hobby shop sales droped 20%, Race track close due to racer's can't no longer support this hobby. Racers are human and their parents got finical problem will still support their son racing? A man afraid of loss job will have moon to play rc?? Well, if people work in Burgerking then it may not affect them too much but I doubt they have the money to race rc. If yes, that tells me they have no saving in bank account, just like most American do not have habit on saving. Anyway, racer still buy Xray but is is less racers now. I believe Xray is having very tough time now and next year unless they make more budget kit to fit into the current financial situation. Well, Dow 8,337.69-241.50-2.81% dropping again. You sure this will not affect racers. Hard to believe this.

mini_mac: You're right. Because USA is the biggest market in the world.

TRF415boy: financial sector is the mother of all business. If mother is in trouble, son will not be good. You said engineering companies aren't hit as bad. Yes, I do believe that. Because it is not the time yet. When is the time, it is about on the news you hear people killing himself of losing money. Remember, stock market always reflects the future.

adamge

iTrader: (1)

Gordie, it's not just a good car. It's a brilliant, phenomenal car.

ioxqq

Tubaboy: Of the size of Xray, it is 99% loan from bank. It is very no smart to chip in his own money and taking all the risk to himself. The problem now is there is drop of sales, no matter how good is the cash flow if the business is not good. They have to cut cost. My point of my first post is, Xray's new manufacture will become useless as the world economy goes down. Xray's boss has bad vision, wrong guess this time. Big loss.

Yea, it is time for buying low now. Will Dow goes down to 5000? Bush: 'We Can Solve This Crisis and We Will'- AP YEAH RIGHT, what is the effect on the 7000b plan?

PitNamedGordie

iTrader: (8)

sosidge

While a discussion about how the "credit crunch" is going to affect RC businesses and hobbies is entirely relevant - why has the OP decided to pick on XRAY?

Some kind of axe to grind or hidden agenda?

RPage

iTrader: (2)

Xray will be fine as long as Hudy is doing ok. Xray is a division of Hudy, and I have serious doubts that Hudy is in business solely for making RC products.

As long as the Hudy empire is making money on the whole, less profitable divisions will be bearable. However, if the entire company starts to see a dramatic drop in gross income, then you would expect to start seeing major changes across all divisions.

Adam?

There's not as much room for "luxury" in a troubled economy. The trend lately sure does seem to be toward more economical cars.

Anders Myrberg

Gitsum

iTrader: (1)

A416 is economical....ummm lets keep buying from Hong Kong...

Adam?

I wasn't talking about me specifically. :-)

Ordering parts from overseas is inconvenient, but not that expensive, especially if you order a lot of things at once. I wasn't suggesting people follow in my footsteps, it's generally been a real hassle. Just noting that my friends here and elsewhere have all been talking a LOT more about using cheaper brands lately.

RC_DAVE4

iTrader: (3)

It's simple, if you want X-Ray to stay in business you need to go out and buy cars and parts from X-Ray (not used X-Ray).

Logika

Only thing I agree that they should bring T2R back, it was cheap and very,very competative for that price. If they make some FRP based chassis again I`ll defenetly buy it.

trailranger

I think you miss the GLOBAL perspective. The US is not the only country in trouble. Many other countries have invested in the U.S. and if we are hurting, they are too. Since the last great depression which was a global event, our countries have increased dependancies for each other with more global trade and specialized industries.

The reason why other R/C companies have cheaper products is because they cut the cost with out sourcing to places with cheap human labor. Why hire an engineer in the US for $100,000 a year when a firm in India will do all the CAD for only $20,000. The same goes with manufacturing cost. Humans still need to man the CNC machines, and why pay someone in the US $30 an hour when it can be done for $5 an hour in Asia.

Itchy

iTrader: (1)

Any argument can go both ways. Yes Xray may be taking a risk investing in quality when the focus seems to be on reducing costs. But alot of their latest sucess was based on the marketing of that quality.

In any case, i dont think xray is that expensive, specially if you consider a lot of their parts (except belts :P) are very reliable compared o the competition.