I think that Heathkit had to be put to sleep because the world had
changed and Heathkit slowly became irrelevant for many different
reasons, some of them permanent, some of them not.

If one keeps those reasons in mind while creating the business plan,
then the only thing left to do is to determine a competitive
price/performance point based on market research.

My thoughts:

1) Kits are not realistic except in upper end niche markets such as
Elecraft due to issues of customer support and liability.

2) I'm not thinking of making rigs capable of world-burning performance
for DX chasing or contesting. Most people are appliance operators,
sad to say and want to just hook up the rigt to power, antenna, and
antenna and go. What I have in mind are gear capable point to point
shortwave links, essentially cross-country rag chew, SSB for Generals
and above, with CW thrown in for the Tech+ and above.

3) What I can think I can offer in gear is stable operation in
abuse-proof enclosures at slightly higher power levels. Part of the
way I can do this is to use 21rst century materials and manufacturing
methods to implement mid-20th century mechanical requirements.

4) There are also a few natural advantages that tube gear has that
semiconductors do not: tube gear is less likely to break upon exposure
to dirty power, EMP, and bad SWR.

5) New tubes are still being made by Russia and China and this will
quite likely stay that way for the forseeable future. Purists might
turn thier nose up at using these tubes, but something workable could
be made out of them for a reasonable price.

7) Also, the price of US manufacturing, and labor are just too high for
anything other than creating a prototype. Basically I am creating a
very useful toy, but only a toy, and will most likely need to import
the manufacturing and labor.

8) I should only offer 80, 40, 30, 20, and 18 meters. I want to stay
as far away from 10 meters as I can, due to possible use of hacked gear
on 11 meters. I don't believe the audience for 160 is very large.

More thoughts?

The Eternal Squire