Nittaku Factive Review

AndySmith wrote: Honestly, I'm not sure.  I don't think it fits into the Fastarc line at all in terms of materials - the topsheet doesn't look like anything I've seen before, that I can remember anyway.  So not like M2/M1 because they were similar apart from sponge hardness.  But certainly a step down in hardness and speed on Fastarc P1, although not as big step as I had anticipated and - crucially - the spin is pretty much just as good.

This is the problem. No one knows what is the purpose of this rubber or most rubbers thrown into the marketplace. Vendor strategy seems to be to come up with new names for opaque technologies, throw it out into the marketplace, and see what happens.

A market strategy must first:

1) Identify a problem

2) Identity the target market

3) Identify how the new product solves the problem for the target market

4) Have the product reviewed/tested/endorsed by members of the target market?

TT marketing, is worse than pitiful.

I did run across a review of Factive on a Russian forum, and in a broken English translation, it appears that the rubber is targeted to entry level players looking to step into the ESN rubbers or those who are using ESN but want to practice with a rubber with more control.

As usual, the reviews were mixed about the rubber, the biggest issue being that there is nothing great to talk about, which is not unexpected, since a reviewer who is fine with the catapult of modern ESN is going to find all entry level rubbers lacking (e.g.Rozena). What the vendors need to do is get entry level players and/or their coaches to review entry level rubbers, but they don't. They just throw it out there into the be-wilderness of hundreds of other rubbers.

This rubber mat be just what I'm looking for - but I have no idea if it is.


Edited by richrf - 11/10/2017 at 1:24pm

I've looked all over (even French forums) for information and positioning about Factive and came up with nothing. If Nittaku is only concerned with the Japanese market, I wish them all the luck competing against Rozena, of which there is tons of information. Sorry, I don't read Japanese.

Does "Made in Germany" essentially mean "Made by ESN" when it comes to rubber?

Edited by Dream1700 - 02/19/2018 at 6:34pm

pitigoi wrote: Factive is interesting, as a medium-hard tensioned rubber lighter than 44g glued. I cannot think of another. Edit: I meant of medium hardness. I only found medium-soft tension rubbers, i.e. Vega Europe, being lighter than 44g.

Matt Pimple wrote: Dream1700 wrote: I am around 1300 strength (West Coast, which is about 2000 on the East Coast scale How did you arrive at this?

thanks for the review