Originally Posted by
White-Light
I think you'll probably find the Fb3 was released way before QS was even thought about.
As for the monetary figures, I wouldn't have a clue but isn't that what happens in every company? What you buy today pays the wages of the technicians for tomorrows product development.
If a company made something for X and sold it for X + only a little bit then they'd run out of money and have to sack all their developers way before the next generation of product could be completed.
The only people who can afford to make only a very very small profit margin on their products are those people like yourself Gary who develop for fun and a little extra spending money and those super conglomerates who sell so many products each day that next to no profit = a lot of bucks anyway, and they certainly aren't in the laser business!
For every other company, a reasonable margin enables development and survival.