CrunchPad demo on Monday as Fusion Garage CEO tells "his side of the story"

A week after Michael Arrington consigned the CrunchPad webslate to the deadpool, his now-estranged partner in the venture – Fusion Garage's Chandrasekar "Chandra" Rathakrishnan – will hold a video webcast in which he promises "to share his side of the story" according to the company's PR agency, as well as briefly demonstrate the device itself.  Rathakrishnan will then go on to show the CrunchPad in various closed-door demo sessions, despite Arrington's assertions that the tablet will now not see the light of day.

In fact, Arrington is "almost certainly" going to take legal action against Fusion Garage, and potentially Rathaskrishnan individually, who have apparently decided they will take the CrunchPad into production without full IP ownership or even the trademarked CrunchPad name.  The breakdown in the project was blamed on Fusion Garage and their investors attempting to start an eleventh-hour renegotiation of the CrunchPad equity split, by threatening to scythe TechCrunch out of the deal altogether.

It's hard to imagine – based on what evidence we've seen up until now – that Rathaskrishnan could offer much that might paint Fusion Garage in a better light.  In the end, though, there are many disappointed geeks who were very ready to put down $300 or thereabouts for an innovative web-centric device; all the legal battles in the world can't deliver that.

[via Gizmodo]