I think we have an opportunity to be more nuanced, as our decisions to move away from vex became more known from team to team. Based on the content of this thread [cw: sexual harassment] An Open Letter to VEX , we can kinda see the actions of the IFI - sponsored teams were due to workplace culture rather than QC problems. And that these accusations can probably singled out to VEX and not any of the companies in the peripheries (Andymark, CTRE, WCP),
NOTE: I’m not saying these other places have or don’t have room for improvement, Im just saying, for now, we have some credible first-hand stories of vex behaving badly, not these other suppliers…
An honest question as our teams make the decision to move away from vex: How can we ensure that our actions don’t have a disparate or more fatal impact to the non-vex companies? Take the Falcon 500 for instance, from my understanding the BLDC is a vex component, and the controller is more of a CTRE component (forgive me if this is over-simplistic). Vex/IFI being a much larger company can probably weather our reticence to buy falcon 500s more than CTRE can.
What about WCP and andymark, who have already agreed to be the goto warehouse suppliers of some of these vex mfg’d product?
Have any teams considered the collateral damage these periphery suppliers would experience? What goes into our decision making to ensure that Vex hears our values loud and clear while minimally impacting these other suppliers?
Have any of the companies working closely with VEX considered the possible ramifications of looking the other way re: the company culture and behavior of the top executives of their business partners?
I think this will sort itself out. It won’t be pretty, but this was a liability other vendors took on when they entered a joint venture with VEX. The ones that care will find ways to divest themselves.
From looking over many of the parts WCP carries it appears that the part numbers of the Vex products they sell start with 217-xxxx and the WCP made products start WCP-xxxx. CTRE posted that the old motor controllers and the Falcon was a joint venture but all the other products they sell are their own design. I’ll see if I can find a link to the post
The answer seems pretty simple to me - don’t buy Vex products from those suppliers. They might have to take a loss when clearing out stock if they divest, but all the suppliers I can think of that do business with Vex have other revenue streams that don’t involve them.
im not about to cry over amazon dying through this. Honestly, the thought of a CD post taking down Amazon is incredibly funny and i would love to watch it happen, but this is far outside the scope of the thread.
Those businesses will manage, with or without IFI and its subsidiaries.
Better phrasing: individual(s) involved in the creation of CTRE, and continued operation and business interaction were aware of IFI/VexPro’s cultural issues prior to recent events.
Perhaps not to the full extent we know now that several employees have spoken out, and likely not seen in the same light that we do on this forum presently, but that knowledge existed.
CTRE made a statement on the f
FRC discord about what products were joint ventures and what products were theirs. I posted a screenshot of the quoted post above
Something to remember is that CTRE is probably in the worst position of any of the normal FRC vendors here. Unlike most others, which are mostly just distributors of vex products, CTRE has multiple products built in direct collaboration with Vex (likely with complicated licensing agreements). I can’t even begin to imagine how to work that through on their end. As much as some would like a quick response from them, anything they do will likely require legal help, and we all know that takes a while.
I am going to agree with Tom here. I have had nothing but great interactions from Mike, Cory, etc from CTRE and I personally know of others who echo this. I don’t think its appropriate to judge the business decisions without direct proof. Did they know that Tony was a controlling ****? Probably. But thats far different than the recent things divulged. I wouldn’t want to be CTRE right now trying to work through legalities of their licensing deals, etc.
Full Disclosure: I also don’t think we should be dragging other companies like WCP, SDS, Andymark, etc who have or sell IFI products. These are larger companies with thousands or more in inventory already. (Not that you have Troy specifically, just making my stance clear across the board).
Sorry if it was not clear @Tom_Line and others, but this is closer to my intention. It’s my understanding that the continued separation of CTRE and IFI is purposeful. These groups should not be roped in with the wrongdoings of IFI’s leadership, but any consequences they suffer indirectly (mainly decreased revenue) due to association aren’t worth losing sleep over. Recent events are not a complete blindside.
Blaming Andymark or CTRE or WCP directly for working with IFI, and boycotting everything they sell is silly and hurts the community. Thankfully I don’t think anybody has actually suggested that, same as DNPing simply for using IFI parts, though the concern and discussion is nice to see.
CTRE certainly has it rough (assuming teams really do get away from the Falcon and move to something else).
WCP doesn’t have it great either. A lot of their products either use Vex parts (like gearboxes), or are kind of intended to expand the Vex ecosystem. I think a lot of their parts will also work with the Rev ION ecosystem, but there will still be some issues.
It will be interesting to see how this ends. I wonder if IFI will think about selling some of the Vex Pro product line to another more ethical supplier. Will be interesting to see what happens…
