Word: segway
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...chances of hurting yourself on a Segway have always been pretty small, and the recall doesn't change that. You really have to try-that is, confuse the machine by making it force you to slow down, hop off its platform, and then immediately jump on again-to befuddle Segway's obscure control software. Still, six people have managed to do exactly that over the past four years, and that has prompted the manufacturer to recall every last one of the machines it has sold. This is actually the second time it has had to do that...
...This is something Segway, Inc., has been extraordinarily reluctant to divulge, saying only that it has so far sold tens of thousands of the machines, and that its business is growing at a 50% annual rate. Well, that description was technically correct - very much so. Turns out, Segway has sold only 23,500 of the transporters. Now it?s clear why its executives were so coy about the details...
...course, if the early predictions of Segway's success had been borne out, we would have a major crisis on our hands. When the machine was unveiled roughly five years ago, Dean Kamen, its official inventor, swore that the world?s car-weary city slickers would snap them up to travel distances too short to drive and too long to walk. As cities around the world move to push bulky, polluting cars out of their congested downtowns, he predicted, Segways would become the urban transporters of choice. He wasn?t alone in his enthusiasm. Such renowned investors and entrepreneurs...
...Experts on innovation - including Geoffrey Moore, a managing director at TCG Advisors in San Mateo, Calif., whose book, Crossing the Chasm, has shaped Segway?s strategy for conquering the recalcitrant market-point out that there are just too many little problems associated with owning a Segway to make the $5,000 you pay to own one seem worthwhile. (Where do you park it? Where can you ride it without angering pedestrians?) In any case, for most urbanites, hopping on a bike or simply walking a little more seems a fine alternative to shelling out so much money...
...much damage will the recall do to Segway?s fortunes? That remains to be seen, although it?s clear that the last thing Segway needs is another marketing problem. But the company says this one can be solved by a software upgrade done at dealerships. And obscurity provides a shield of sorts for the struggling company. Since many people haven?t even heard of Segways, let alone seen one, the bad publicity generated by this particular recall isn?t likely to resonate in the typical consumer?s mind, or do too much long-term damage...