DJ Models: company wound-up and liquidation closed

[Bedlington North]

I spotted that too and it immediately made me doubt everything else presented as "facts" in that quoted release.

[The Stationmaster]

15 hours ago, cctransuk said:

I do hope - though I think it a forlorn hope - that none of those members who shouted the praises of DJM from the housetops, when he left Dapol and started to announce his own products, are now decrying him so vociferously.

 

I seem to recall an atmosphere of almost religious frenzy here at the time - when anyone daring to sound a note of caution was condemned outright as a destructive and faithless doubter!

 

Yours cynically,

John Isherwood.

I happily supported Dave in his early years of going solo although I expressed concerns (including directly to him) that he needed to be very careful about capitalisation because his ambitions seemed to be running far ahead of any possible income stream.  Over time, and only a year or two on, it became increasingly obvious to me that his business was - for whatever reason - not proceeding on a very sound footing and was likely to end up in trouble.  Hence I became one of those who tried to drop warning hints as some of his later projects, particularly the APT, emerged because by then for anyone who cared to look he had a pretty solid record of not delivering most of his own original projects and he had apparently lost all his commissioned work which obviously reduced the availability of capital arising from business profits.  It was really only necessary to look at his accounts at Companies House, and his over late submission of them (under threat of being struck off), together with his record of non-achievement to form an opinion that all in the garden might not be as rosy as might be thought by some.

 

I see nothing at all wrong with supporting people, including Dave, who take brave new steps in the business area of our hobby.  And if various people had not done exactly that with their own money or a mortgage on their home our hobby would be in a rather sadder state today than it actually is today with many fewer r-t-r models about and with all sorts of developments in numerous areas of railway modelling not being available to us.  Many have succeeded which is no reason to condemn those who have failed.  But equally with any business there can come a time when the warning signs, should you care to look for them, begin to outweigh the good news and one's opinion of that business or those responsible for running it begin to change.  And as far as I'm concerned before I put any of my money anywhere I will pay far wider attention to the background (and its past achievements in the case of an established outfit) of a concern offering whatever sort of 'shiny new goody' rather than simply looking wide eyed and putting down the money because  'I want'.

[The Stationmaster]

33 minutes ago, BoD said:

According to that report today is the day the company runs out of money. 
I know this virus thingy has stretched time but .......

Is it down to the way the liquidators preseent things I wonder?  In other words by a particular date they finally draw the line and that is when the shortfall (in this case is) has the line drawn under it?

[Chris M]

I foolishly pit some money down for a king. I was a bit doubtful at the time bit decided to give Dave the benefit of the doubt.

With hindsight I suspect Dave knew there was no hope by the time he was asking for deposits but it would be impossible to prove this. It may be that he was genuinely under a delusion that he could still succeed. Either way it's over now and there nothing anyone can do. Can't see Dave showing his face at any exhibitions when they start up again.

I can't bring myself to show an interest in the KR models project. 

[phil-b259]

2 minutes ago, D1051 said:

The oo class 71 , what happens to the tooling ?

 

has happened you mean.

 

The report which was shared the other day is the final one done at the END of the insolvency process - long after an assets (which includes any tooling) has been sold on.

 

There is no obligation for the company doing the winding up to tell anyone who actually bought the various assess which were sold - all they need to do is state what they got back from the sale of them.

 

Consequently unless a manufacturer starts turning out another batch of 71s using them we will be no wiser as to where they have gone and speculation is just that.

[jonhall]

58 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Consequently unless a manufacturer starts turning out another batch of 71s using them we will be no wiser as to where they have gone and speculation is just that.

 

And the Chinese may believe that they own the rights to the model and for all we know, the contract doesn't specifically say otherwise, so who could challenge them? I think more likely the tooling sitting in a dusty store never to be seen again, has already been weighed in for scrap, or a toolmaker has seen a big lump of steel and thought - I'll machine that back to flat stock and make a new mould for plastic teaspoons - or whatever else the factory has been paid to make this week.

 

Jon 

[Clearwater]

I would expect that each of the other firms (Bachmann, Hornby, Heljan, Dapol etc) would have spoken to the administrator to enquire about what assets they could buy.  As part of their diligence, they’d have wanted to see what contracts were in place with factories and where the IP lies.  Depending on the position, those manufacturers may elect to approach factories direct.  Equally, if I was a factory and I owned tools, I’d be contacting the distributing firms to offer my wares.  In Hornby’s position, I might have tried to buy the class 71 and J94 rights to take them off the market.  We’ll see over the next few years what emerges.

Edited June 4, 2020 by Clearwater
Clarity

[adb968008]

I will miss DJ models thread, Never a dull day back then, you’d turn up login and see what hand grenade had landed in the DJ thread that day.

 

Of particular note I still remember the day the Chinese manufacturer rolled onto the forum, expressed his opinions of Dave publicly. Missed oppourtunity that was, as several chose to rubbish his language skill without waiting for his credentials So he withdrew... had they waited for his message....

 

He did reach out to several of us privately to express his position and the outcome he had already achieved, which was some months before DJ went, so several of us knew what was coming, and some of which is still to come.

DJ has gone, but i’m pretty confident his tooling haven’t.

 

 

[Chris M]

In Europe it is normal for the company who pays for the tooling to own it and have control over it. In China the factory who made the tooling usually own and control the toolong regardless of who paid for it. 

 

 

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

When is the film being released?

 

Mike.

[truffy]

18 minutes ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

When is the film being released?

 

Mike.

It's currently in casting. I understand that Johnny Vegas has been approached to play @DJM Dave, with Bruce Willis touted for @AY Mod. A large part will be set in Shanghai, so as to assure Chinese funding; as all the best Hollywood blockbusters do.

[PJT]

10 hours ago, Chris M said:

In Europe it is normal for the company who pays for the tooling to own it and have control over it. In China the factory who made the tooling usually own and control the toolong regardless of who paid for it.

 

In Europe it's also often the case for the commissioning company to own the work done to create the tools, but for the toolmaker/factory to retain ownership of the materials the tools are made from, the obvious result of which being that one party can usually do very little without the cooperation of the other (e.g. the commissioner cannot unilaterally decide to move the tools elsewhere or to sell them on to another organisation, while the factory cannot decide on a whim to run the tools for another customer). 

 

This is particularly common with what are known as 'soft' tools for limited production or low volume presswork, where the tools are created relatively cheaply by casting them from a pattern, but the material used in the casting process (usually Kirksite) is very expensive.  Admittedly that example's for presswork (i.e. panelwork and bracket pressforming), because that's where the bulk of my knowledge and experience is, but similar arrangements are pretty common in the injection moulding and blow moulding industries.

 

Pete T.

 

Edited June 5, 2020 by PJT
Extra example added, first paragraph.

[Chris M]

I'd like to have a word with Dave round the back of the bike sheds with a few of my mates.

 

Hope I don't get detention for saying this.:)

[Vistisen]

9 hours ago, truffy said:

It's currently in casting. I understand that Johnny Vegas has been approached to play @DJM Dave, with Bruce Willis touted for @AY Mod. A large part will be set in Shanghai, so as to assure Chinese funding; as all the best Hollywood blockbusters do.

Bruce Willis if far too much of a pussy for that role. it must be Ray Winstone for AY

[Vistisen]

1 hour ago, Chris M said:

I'd like to have a word with Dave round the back of the bike sheds with a few of my mates.

 

Hope I don't get detention for saying this.:)

Ahh a member the 'TRUMP' school of how society should be run. Threats of violence can actually be  a crime

[RedgateModels]

Just now, Vistisen said:

Ahh a member the 'TRUMP' school of how society should be run. Threats of violence can actually be  a crime

 

Who said anything about violence? far different things happened behind the bike sheds in my day .......

[truffy]

12 minutes ago, RedgateModels said:

far different things happened behind the bike sheds in my day .......

If you're suggesting that Mr Jones engage in some kind of 'screw for a screw' transaction, then if it were me I think I'd rather lose the money.

[DY444]

On 03/06/2020 at 21:28, cctransuk said:

I do hope - though I think it a forlorn hope - that none of those members who shouted the praises of DJM from the housetops, when he left Dapol and started to announce his own products, are now decrying him so vociferously.

 

I seem to recall an atmosphere of almost religious frenzy here at the time - when anyone daring to sound a note of caution was condemned outright as a destructive and faithless doubter!

 

Yours cynically,

John Isherwood.

 

Surely even those that did sing his praises at the time are entitled to have had reasonable expectations that the business plan (of which they had no knowledge) would be sound and the company would be managed competently? 

 

It seems to me that praising the proprietor of a new venture for its product plans and promised high quality of those products and then criticising the proprietor when the venture fails in no small part to his actions is wholly reasonable.  I don't see how an individual is disqualified from criticising the failure of a venture just because they were previously enthused by its promises.

[cctransuk]

46 minutes ago, DY444 said:

It seems to me that praising the proprietor of a new venture for its product plans and promised high quality of those products and then criticising the proprietor when the venture fails in no small part to his actions is wholly reasonable.  I don't see how an individual is disqualified from criticising the failure of a venture just because they were previously enthused by its promises.

 

Because exercising due diligence would make one very wary of someone who needed to ask for money up-front for a product that was still only a figment of his imagination.

 

If someone approached you with a proposal to produce a new kettle / toaster / food mixer, and wanted you to fund it up-front, would you oblige?

 

Any company that proposes a new venture of high quality should have been able to convince a financial institution to provide funding; if they can't, you should ask why!

 

This whole tale of woe is a classic case of letting enthusiasm and hype cloud judgement, and come before common sense and financial prudence.

 

I hope those affected have learned a lesson.

 

John Isherwood.

[Fenman]

2 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

...

I hope those affected have learned a lesson.

 

John Isherwood.

 

Blimey: you sound as if you're enjoying life up there on the moral high ground.

 

A few years back there was a lovely tv interview with Ken Livingstone when he was invited to crow at the failure of one of the policies of his successor as Mayor of London, BoJo, something about which Ken had warned at the time. Ken declined to crow, on the grounds that no human had ever become more sexually desirable as a result of constantly crowing "I told you so".  

 

Paul

[truffy]

3 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

Any company that proposes a new venture of high quality should have been able to convince a financial institution to provide funding; if they can't, you should ask why!

That sweeping generalisation overlooks the fact that there have been a number of successful ventures that started out on the likes of Kickstarter. Yes, there have been failures too, but that's also the case if you look at the more traditional funding models.

 

The problem with DJM was that he was a bit of a nudge-nudge, wink-wink, nod's-as-good-as-a-wink-to-a-blind-man likely lad. Mate's rates and all that malarky.

[The Stationmaster]

14 hours ago, Clearwater said:

I would expect that each of the other firms (Bachmann, Hornby, Heljan, Dapol etc) would have spoken to the administrator to enquire about what assets they could buy.  As part of their diligence, they’d have wanted to see what contracts were in place with factories and where the IP lies.  Depending on the position, those manufacturers may elect to approach factories direct.  Equally, if I was a factory and I owned tools, I’d be contacting the distributing firms to offer my wares.  In Hornby’s position, I might have tried to buy the class 71 and J94 rights to take them off the market.  We’ll see over the next few years what emerges.

One factory was touting round various 'DJM models' before DJM went into liquidation allegedly because it was owed money by DJM and one way of recovering something would be to get the models back into the marketplace via a different UK trade customer.  I understand there were no takers and in many respects that isn't surprising because standing aside any potential legal tangle with DJM - which of course still existed then as a company - the market was hardly going to be encouraging.   The j94 stands in direct competition with Hornby's model and in my opinion simply could not compete on a sound commercial basis with Hornby's for all sorts of reasons.  Class 71 models from the past are still spoken of as lying in some retailers' stock cupboards so irrespective of anything else the market would appear not to exist for a new run and in any case the very low gearing would need altering to improve marketability.

 

The only one where I would think there is any glimmer of a possibility is the N gauge Class 17 but it has been said by various folk, who know far more about the real ones than I ever did, that it would need a lot of work to get it right so that would be more a matter of investment rather than marketing something for which some tooling exists.  We know the IP/CADs for N gauge Shark and 'King' have been bought by KR and they are moving towards production so that's accounted for just about everything and that ties up neatly with the received sum of £2,300 in the liquidator's report.  Quite what stage the second factory's work on the Class 92 has reached is really irrelevant as it would not find any room in the marketplace while the APT CADs were a very long way short of complete and Hornby is charging ahead with its model - so no deal for either of those.

 

I still doubt any of the Chinese factories would go to production off what tooling etc does exist under the former DJM brand (i.e excluding commissioned models which are, I understand, all accounted for with the commissioners) without a UK marketing partner and that takes us back to my comments above.  Neither can I see any reason for any UK company to buy up former DJM brand tooling or CADs simply to protect their own position - there's no need for them to do so even where potentially competing products (i.e the J94 and Class 71) exist because they can probably do just as well with what they have.   The liquidator's final report indicates that no tooling has been bought from the liquidator - it was shown as 'Nil' in the Statement of Affairs which indicates that there was none indisputably in DJM's ownership which could be sold.   As for commissioned models - well in most cases the commissioners had already finished up, for various reasons, dealing directly with the factory instead of through DJM so there's no reason for the factory to go elsewhere. 

[The Stationmaster]

1 hour ago, RedgateModels said:

 

Who said anything about violence? far different things happened behind the bike sheds in my day .......

You were lucky, the bike shed at my school fell down.

 

23 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

 

Because exercising due diligence would make one very wary of someone who needed to ask for money up-front for a product that was still only a figment of his imagination.

 

If someone approached you with a proposal to produce a new kettle / toaster / food mixer, and wanted you to fund it up-front, would you oblige?

 

Any company that proposes a new venture of high quality should have been able to convince a financial institution to provide funding; if they can't, you should ask why!

 

This whole tale of woe is a classic case of letting enthusiasm and hype cloud judgement, and come before common sense and financial prudence.

 

I hope those affected have learned a lesson.

 

John Isherwood.

Lest we forget we should not overlook the fact that, a couple of years before its liquidation,  DJM was advanced a considerable sum of money by Funding Circle, a commercial concern which at that time was producing a rate of return nearer to 10% than 5% for its funders.  (Although I freely admit that on learning it had advanced money to DJM I suggested to a couple of people I know that they should both quickly get out of Funding Circle any money that had put there)

[cctransuk]

20 minutes ago, truffy said:

The problem with DJM was that he was a bit of a nudge-nudge, wink-wink, nod's-as-good-as-a-wink-to-a-blind-man likely lad. Mate's rates and all that malarky.

 

Precisely - would you buy a used car - or a fictional locomotive - from that man?

 

John Isherwood.

[cctransuk]

23 minutes ago, Fenman said:

Blimey: you sound as if you're enjoying life up there on the moral high ground.

 

Not moral high ground - just a sensible level of cynicism.

 

I learnt years ago, having been for some time financially under-provided, that one's income is hard-earned, and should not be disposed of at the behest of a 'flim-flam man'. Show me a product - or a sound record of producing quality products - and I'll likely buy, or pre-order, if I have a use for it.

 

If it's a new venture, be very wary from the outset. If the proposer needs your money to proceed, regard the proposal as no more than a 'hot tip' on the Grand National - and don't moan and blame the trainer / horse / jockey when it fails to come home at all; yet alone first across the line!

 

John Isherwood.