release dates

Hi Danny, many thanks for your reply. i was reading yesterday that the sub gen 3 and the sonos 5 were released june 2020….so 3 years ago

surely, they’ve managed to improve both since then? i have gen 1’s of both and there was the whole debacle over ceasing updates on them a couple of years ago, so i really don’t want to shell out 1300 quid (with trade in) only for a new version to be released in a few months. i know if you contact customer services they won’t tell you, but i’m really reluctant to buy at the mo’ just in case. Is there somewhere you can leave your email address for product updates? i have all my details and permissions in this community, but never receive product updates. 
  

Manufacturers are reluctant to pre-release update or replacement model details too soon because sales of current models will typically stop, trapping the company with unsalable inventory and no income. There have been a few classic business failures because of this. The main reason for pre-announcement is to capture sales that might have gone to competitors who have recently announced or introduced their own ‘new improved’.

One large manufacturer has an interesting strategy that works for them. They pre-establish a fixed schedule and production run for a product: “introduction”, “sales”, and “discontinued”. There is a brief early adopter (sometimes discount) introduction period to generate excitement among the early adopters, followed by the routine sales period, and the final (discount) discontinued period for customers who only buy discontinued merchandise. If the model is very successful and inventory sells out early, there will be no discontinued period. Running out of inventory is not a disaster because more than the projected profit has already been realized and the replacement model is already on schedule, and probably in production.