ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY BLOG | INVENTIONS FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES

A number of my readers have sent me comments about the Livesribe Pulse Smartpen, and I wanted to share this update from Jim Marggraff, CEO who posted this message on the Livescribe Blog today.

3/28 Update from CEO Jim Marggraff

March 28th, 2008

Greetings,

I would like to thank the thousands of readers, writers, bloggers, callers, developers, scribers and buyers for your support and interest in our Pulse smartpen and platform.

We have been overwhelmed with requests for information and preorders for Pulse that have far exceeded our early projections.

As this demand has accelerated in the past month, we have continued working towards our first shipment date of March 31st, and have struggled to determine how to address preorders that far exceed our early production ramp. We noted Amazon’s approach to handling shipment for their high-demand Kindle e-book, and ongoing Wii shortages, and have compared this to our own challenge, as a new company, to address our backlog.

In retrospect, our hiatus in our communication is long overdue. I apologize for this. As I considered posting a blog entry numerous times, new concerns regarding growing demand arose, as well as meeting our growing backlog. Perhaps we were overly cautious in not wanting to send an ambiguous message.

The time for ambiguity is past.

I am delighted to announce that we will begin shipping in limited volume on March 31st, as targeted.

To address our backlog, we will open the Livescribe Store only to our preorder list of customers, enabling you to immediately place a credit card order on Monday. At that time, we will provide you with an estimated shipment date based upon when you first preordered your smartpen. If you are already on our preorder list, look for an email on Monday, March 31st with instructions on how to complete your order.

Thanks again for you patience! We look forward to welcoming you to the Livescribe community.

Best regards,

Jim