I have to admit that I have an ulterior motive asking this question.
In this thread guys that seem to have some insight as to what is going on inside FrSky all hint that there are changes coming. I'm trying to understand why.
First a bit of History When FrSky started to offer the Taranis X9D, their first transmitter, they wanted to have a very powerful programming capability for the radio. They could have done like other companies and offered a menu driven program. That would have been the safe thing to do, but...
forum.alofthobbies.com
OpenTX is head and shoulders above anything else on the market for an RC operating system. I can't for the life of me understand why FrSky would want to move away from OpenTX. There was/is a false impression that OpenTX is too complicated. That is why FrSky tried their hand at writing their own operating system known as FOS. For a myriad of reason this was a total failure.
OpenTX can be as simple to use as any other RC computer TX OS. (Ok, adding the dual rate and expo does add a step or two) Or it can be as complicated and liberating as one want's.
The only reason I can think of for FrSky wanting to move away from OpenTX is that they must now have to pay OpenTX for having OpenTX on their radio. To the bean counters eliminating this expense would lower the cost of the radio. Helping them "compete" with the new upstarts (AKA clones).
What I think FrSky fails to recognize is that in the past OpenTX was what differentiated them from most other RC OEMs. So much so that the market place was willing to overlook FrSky's many missteps. This was clustered mainly around their poor engineering with the introduction of new products. That is most FrSky products after say 2015 were improperly validated/ tested prior to being introduced into the market place.
Now in the last few years there are now a few radio OEMs that run OpenTX. This has taken away FrSky's advantage in the marketplace and brought into tighter focus the short comings of FrSky's engineering. FrSky is seeing this in lost sales. Combine this loss of uniqueness with the clones selling OpenTx radios at a 15% or so discount and FrSky sees a threat to their bottom line.
With the "X20" radio it looks like FrSky wants to blame OpenTX for the drop in FrSky sales. And to bolster FrSky's bottom line they want to shed any costs to OpenTX in the new radio [X20 (?)].
From my perspective this is false economy, shedding the strongest feature of your product because there is an out source charge associated with using it!
FrSky needs to learn that the use of OpenTX is their strongest selling point! True, other radio OEMs are now using OpenTX. So this is bringing the short comings of FrSky to light. In the past the market would over look the engineering short comings of FrSky, but no longer!
While OpenTX is no longer the unique province of FrSky it is still FrSky's strongest asset. What FrSky needs to do is address their weak points, mainly their engineering validation and product introduction process.
FrSky still has the innovative chops to stay ahead of the competition. But if the customer experience with new product introduction isn't improved. The customer will go to Jumper, and the like, for the same level of frustration but at a 15% discount.
FrSky you have a major problem but it's not the cost of OpenTX . It is your own corporate culture where the customer experiences isn't at the fore front of your business decisions.
Now I'm open to interpretations, other than cost, as to why FrSky wants to distance themselves from OpenTX.
All the best,
Konrad
