I know people who are intimately acquainted with Asians who say that the concept of honor is a bit stereotypical. My own experience dealing with Banggood's Customer Service would lead me to agree.
I agree here but this is the front line, not corporate decisions at director level. That is where the owners do not want to lose face. Still times have changed.
I don't believe DJI rushed their Mavic product announcement due the Karma announcement. DJI specifically stated that the primary cause for the delay was a problem with a component. They didn't elaborate but it could have been availability or performance related quality issues. Being regularly engaged in the development of high tech products I often see project schedules slip due to unexpected complications. As the tear downs have shown the Mavic is ground breaking because it represents a sophistication of design that has heretofore not been seen in hobby drones. Given the level of design integration required between the aircraft and the remote controller and the very compact form factor of both this is probably just one hiccup of many that they have encountered along the way.
The Mavic is revolutionary for the drone market as a whole. I'll bet there are military drone development teams that are thunder struck by what DJI has accomplished with the Mavic. In fact it wouldn't surprise me if the Mavic has received support from Chinese military drone development efforts. Swarms are a big topic in military applications of drones. A swarm of small, powerful, intelligent, hardened drones that are sharing situational awareness will be a decisive force multiplier.
DJI's Mavic would kill the sales of their other drones. The stalling tactic allows the distributors to clear the shelves of their surplus inventory. Release a few to 'calm' the consumers. Etc.
I agree that this was nothing more then a manufacturing issue and do believe it was a third party failing to meet the demand. As much as it would be nice to build every part in house some have to be outsourced and I don't think anyone saw this demand coming. No one expected the Karmas to just fold like it did so Mavics absorbed all of those sales and then some.
DJI just hit a grand slam with this drone and they are running as fast as they can to catch up. We are seeing availability in a lot of places so it looks like they are finally catching up some in the US. I know international markets are still behind and hope they get theirs soon.
Talking to the local DJI store the owner told me he sold over 100 Mavics and less then 10 P4s and P3s. That is a big difference.