DiveJedi:
You better run Doc
.....I know DUI makes a great suit, but I'm talking about an MSRP of $699!
Hmmmmm, for that MSRP I might be inclined to buy one myself. That's something I would be interested in seeing.
The problem from your point of view is not whether there is a market or not, as there clearly is one, but is it a
large enough market to make investing in the product worthwhile?
Like Floater says, even for dedicated mixed gas divers, most really warm ocean guys prefer wetsuits. Then too, the majority of guys who dive double steels with trimix in cold ocean environments don't often take their doubles with them on vacation - they wind up diving more standard recreational profiles during their warm ocean vacations. (Not to mention that helium mixes and chamber rides and proximities can be more problematic in many remote resort destinations...)
So, with the exception of anomalous data points some 3 standard deviations from the mean consisting of recreational warm ocean divers who simply get really cold even in warm ocean, the bulk of your potential market consists of either technical mixed gas divers who happen to live where there is warm ocean (and go real deep), or technical mixed gas divers who are willing to pay to ship their rebreathers and gear from wherever they live to warm ocean remote destinations.
I have no empirical evidence regarding how large that market segment is, but I do understand that technical diving is a smallish segment of the overall scuba market; thus, this represents a yet smaller sub-set of a smallish sub-set of the overall scuba market. I suspect it might come down to how many units you would need to sell each period in order to make the prospect profitable.
But for that MSRP, I certainly would be willing to give it a try!
Doc