LH LABS: Never received your crowd funded product?

Discussion in 'General Audio Discussion' started by Blake, Feb 12, 2019.

  1. Blake

    Blake Acquaintance

    Joined:
    Jun 29, 2018
    Likes Received:
    39
    Trophy Points:
    18
    Location:
    Salt Lake City
  2. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

    Staff Member Pyrate BWC
    Joined:
    Sep 24, 2015
    Likes Received:
    89,774
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Padre Island CC TX
    Looks like I got beaten to posting this. This is a public service message. I have no opinion either way. I don't care. Gavin Fish's peddling of constant upgrades to the Pulse seemed fishy enough to me. All the warning signs were there, but I didn't want to rain on anyone's parade with the promise of Femto clocks and all.

    My warnings regarding crowdsourcing have already been stated: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.org/index.php?threads/the-risks-of-crowdfunding.252/

    There is an effort started at https://audiophilestyle.com to document all paid but not received products from LHL. The plan is to reach a critical mass and forward the data and complaint to the California State Attorney's Office for legal action. We are looking for as many contributors as possible to forward their data:

    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vE7_LByDDY6w8J-E-l4njfkvXcggTasrG90z11swJww/edit?usp=sharing
     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2019
  3. Slaphead

    Slaphead Facebook Friend

    Joined:
    Apr 4, 2017
    Likes Received:
    138
    Trophy Points:
    33
    Location:
    Zürich, Switzerland
    This exactly. I've been involved in a couple of crowdsourcing campaigns from an "investor" angle and they've failed to come through. No biggie, because I went in eyes open, and was fully prepared to write the money off. Which leads me to the most important part of getting involved with crowdfunding - never ever invest more money than you're prepared, or more importantly, can afford to lose. I'm currently involved with another one, by proxy as it was a birthday gift from my GF, that looks very much like it's going rapidly south, but hey ho, it's the thought that counts when it comes to gifts, isn't it?

    From what I've seen is that most crowdfunding projects are led by people who are actually honest and passionate about the product they want to fund and bring to market, but they lack experience.

    One of the biggest failings that I can see is that most of the cost estimates in terms of bringing a product to market are woefully underestimated. The cost estimates are almost always based on the perfect execution - there's practically no "what if" included, let alone worst case scenario. There's no contingency built into their model. Most crowdfunding projects would do way better if they asked for double, or even quadruple, their original figure.

    However where it goes south fastest is in the production. There is often little or no knowledge, or experience, of the component supply chain or production processes, meaning missed production slots, which still have to be paid for, and massive delays in getting another production slot. Also what works really well in the prototypes often doesn't translate into the production process, and modifications need to be made, if those modifications are at all feasible. This is most often where it becomes game over.

    It's a minefield - enter at your own risk.
     
  4. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

    Staff Member Pyrate BWC
    Joined:
    Sep 24, 2015
    Likes Received:
    89,774
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Padre Island CC TX
    Oh my. I had no idea.

    $1,665,254 raised for the Geek Wave. 3478% funded on July 12, 2014.

    There is authentic fail (which I will defend), but this is fraud considering the "fake" updates with that recent one with the OEM board.

    Looks like someone said F'it and ran off with the money while posting dubious BS on product development efforts (boneheaded development to that) to stave off claims of fraud.
     
  5. brencho

    brencho Friend

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Dec 18, 2015
    Likes Received:
    7,978
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    LA
    The Tesla isn't going to pay for itself you know...
     
  6. Blake

    Blake Acquaintance

    Joined:
    Jun 29, 2018
    Likes Received:
    39
    Trophy Points:
    18
    Location:
    Salt Lake City
    Yep, and that person is Larry Ho (who is now trying to sell IEM's under Light Harmonic), claiming LH Labs was a separate venture out of one side of his mouth, yet Larry has millions of dollars for undelivered product from the various crowd funding campaigns, and never bothered to go through formal winding down of LH Labs and paying off his creditors, aka the campaign contributors (LH Labs is now adminstratively dissolved). IGG rules (and civil and criminal laws) require him to return all these funds, but Larry refuses to do so. So in essence, he is telling us all to piss off. He thinks the money is his.

    His not so subtle plan is to try to provide b.s. updates to keep us at bay via his public mouthpiece Jarek, while waiting for the Statute of Limitations to run for breach of contract claims in civil court, and embezzlement in criminal court.
     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2019
  7. Azteca

    Azteca Friend

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2015
    Likes Received:
    1,581
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Location:
    Cincinnati, Ohio
    I will say I contributed to the spreadsheet. We're at $80.84K. Let's add a digit, shall we? I think getting this into the hundreds of thousands would really demand some more attention from the AG, press or whomever.
     
  8. Zhanming057

    Zhanming057 Friend

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Dec 13, 2018
    Likes Received:
    1,033
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Location:
    NYC
    My understanding is that even if they assumed partial liability of the Kickstarter funds, they'd go under as a company. LH is pretty small and their flagship DACs don't sell at that well, even in Asia. I've followed the story rather closely since a very close friend of mine is an official distributor for LH. This is the version of the story that I find most convincing:

    1. Larry was hit by a windfall of Indiegogo cash, far exceeding what they had expected, and they carelessly promised the moon and then some to backers. I'm going to be charitable here and assume that at this point they were at least earnest about building a real product.
    2. Very shortly after they got the money, they realized that they were in over their heads, that they really could not put together all of the features they promised, at that price point, or find an OEM that could get the volume they needed that wouldn't rip them off.
    3. At some point, they got close to a production-ready unit but it was bug-ridden and pretty terrible. Larry had the option of either releasing a subpar product that was still a money sink, or come out about the failure and refund whatever was left, or go into denial mode. Option 3 allowed him to keep the remaining cash, and he decided to stiff the backers de facto by pretending to continue development. If the stature of limitations runs out then he gets away scott free.
    4. Now it gets into real fraud. My understanding is that he did use the money to fund some R&D but not really for the Wave. A couple years down the road, the excuses have all but dried up, and he came across as a thief in his dispute with Ken. If he confessed right now the company won't survive the incoming lawsuits.

    It's about time that people held him responsible. It should be pretty easy to find evidence but someone needs to take him to court.
     
  9. JK47

    JK47 Guest

    TLDR

    Larry deserves a good old fashioned beat down at the very least.
     
  10. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

    Staff Member Pyrate BWC
    Joined:
    Sep 24, 2015
    Likes Received:
    89,774
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Padre Island CC TX
    Last I heard, he's skedaddled to China or Taiwan. It's gone. Still worthwhile to pursue this as maybe Canadian authorities can nab him if he ever transits through Vancouver.

    For some reason, I doubt good accounting practices were in place. It might be pretty easy to show fraud. He should return whatever money was not spent on R&D and his Tesla.
     
  11. jexby

    jexby Posole Prince

    Staff Member Pyrate Contributor
    Joined:
    Sep 28, 2015
    Likes Received:
    8,145
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Exit stage left....
    last email received from Larry in June 2018 from the light harmonic domain, came from China after looking at the raw SMTP source.
    61.148.245.xxx
    "is an IP address range owned by China Unicom Beijing Province"

    I'm sure some Californian can do a drive by of the LH offices 10600 Industrial Ave. Suite 120. Roseville. CA. 95678
    and post photos of newspapers or windows boarded up?
     
  12. restrav3

    restrav3 Likes Audio-GD

    Contributor
    Joined:
    Jun 18, 2018
    Likes Received:
    101
    Trophy Points:
    43
    Location:
    PA
    it is not just larry, many of the crowdfunding efforts were initiated and masterminded by Gavin, i know because he told us in the forum in the very early days. im sure he is in california. it would be a mistake to exclude his name from any legal filings
     
  13. captkirk

    captkirk Khan's BFF

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Sep 1, 2017
    Likes Received:
    1,877
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Location:
    Sactown-ish
    Easily doable.

    I’ll report back tomorrow.
     
  14. noshortcuts

    noshortcuts New

    Joined:
    Nov 16, 2016
    Likes Received:
    2
    Trophy Points:
    3
    Location:
    Bay Area, CA.
    1.6 million is nothing. LHL raked in over $6 million around the same time with a handful of related "campaigns" on Indiegogo. And that does not include all the perks/upgrades/add-ons that they kept pumping out and promoting on a weekly basis while also pretending to be completely on target for the "production and shipping" phase.

    I believe they never hinted at being behind schedule until most all campaigns and upgrades had completed. Because many of those add-ons were taken care of through email with "invoices" and payments over Paypal I doubt those amounts are included in the Indiegogo totals - but maybe. No matter what Larry or Gavin's original intents were - they have ripped off a lot of people of 1000's of dollars individually and millions in total.

    Personally I think Indiegogo needs a class action suit. They promote and profit off all campaigns including many that are obvious fakes from the beginning. They don't care. I imagine it's because it's easy money for Gogo and there are legal loopholes for this business model.

    Laws need to change. I get that "investing" is risky but it shouldn't be legal to promote and profit off getting people to "invest" in what end up being fancy marketing campaigns that can deliver product worth nothing or even deliver nothing at all.
     
    Last edited: Feb 12, 2019
  15. Augmentin

    Augmentin MOT - DUNU IEM Company

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Jul 2, 2016
    Likes Received:
    189
    Trophy Points:
    33
    Location:
    Between TPE and LA
    Larry was just in China in mid-January for the Oscar XXI announcement in Beijing. It's conceivable he's still there, as he's planning a visit to Taiwan in late February.
     
  16. Jozurr

    Jozurr Facebook Friend

    Joined:
    Oct 20, 2015
    Likes Received:
    208
    Trophy Points:
    43
    The Fyre Festival of the audiophile world.
     
  17. Garuspik

    Garuspik Tovarisch Ukrainian Terminator MOT - Verum

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    May 6, 2018
    Likes Received:
    3,316
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Location:
    Ukraine
    I do like the idea of law responsibility of companies that received funding via kickstarter\indiegogo\etc.
    Scammers spoil all the idea and now people just don't believe in any crowdfunding campaigns.
     
  18. Thad E Ginathom

    Thad E Ginathom Friend

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Sep 27, 2015
    Likes Received:
    14,134
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    India
    I'm sure I wasn't the only one to be tempted to compare your campaign to Wave debacle/scam. I was probably also not the only one to feel that even alluding to LHL in your thread would have been like leaving a turd on a friend's carpet.

    I was a latecomer to the whole story. One of the things that I wondered was how the hell does this guy even afford all these trips to China on which everything is going to be made just wonderful.
    Well, that supports a good few "business trips," I guess...
    ...Business class?

    And I wonder if the trite, allegedly once human, PR Bot(s) should be in the Dock too.

    I'm sure there's a human-tragedy angle to all this. But hell, it's not ok for one guy's human tragedy to cost so many others so f'ing much.
     
  19. restrav3

    restrav3 Likes Audio-GD

    Contributor
    Joined:
    Jun 18, 2018
    Likes Received:
    101
    Trophy Points:
    43
    Location:
    PA
    i was facebook friend with gavin fish for 2 years and I unfriended him when he started sending messages asking for testimonials for lhlabs and at this time I was already telling people that this is a scam so I unfriended him(well that and his shitty conservative republican posts lol). i just looked him up and he has moved to PA lol. albeit not that close to me. im in the eastern most part of PA.
     
  20. Gemini

    Gemini Facebook Friend

    Joined:
    Mar 7, 2017
    Likes Received:
    93
    Trophy Points:
    33
    Location:
    Chicagoland
    Looks like the LHlabs.com site is still up contentwise, but hitting any of the "Buy Now" or "Reserve" buttons results in a Sorry, the page you were looking for does not exist or is not available. message.

    I was one of the early backers of the Geek Pulse back in 2013 and did receive the DAC from the indiegogo campaign, but at that point I was so tired of the used car salesman/carnival schtick that as soon as the DAC arrived I put it on Ebay and said good riddance, never want anything to do with this company again.
     

Share This Page