We’ve got it on several accounts and reliable sources that Jebao has not only been developing a knock off of the MaxSpect Gyre Pump, but that it’s ready to be revealed to the world. Depending on who you are, Jebao is either a bane of the aquarium hobby with its copycat products, or a savior of it with its entry-level prices.
Jebao has unscrupulously ‘lifted’ the design for many of their products including the widely used WP series pumps, their dosing pump, and many many other devices. On the one hand, regardless of which company has slapped their sticker on a DC pump, the Jebao-made controllable DC pump has revolutionized our approach to fine tuning water flow speeds in our aquariums and devices. On the other hand, Jebao has blatantly ripped off many aquarium companies of intellectual property.
The next device that will get the ‘Jebao Treatment’ is the MaxSpect Gyre,which is supposedly strongly protected by several layers of patents and trademarks in China and abroad, but that hasn’t deterred the Chinese mass-reproducer of aquarium products from making their own. MaxSpect actually knew that a copycat product out of China was inevitable so they’ve just done their due diligence to make the best possible version of their own product, constantly refining with better rotors, noise-reducing mounts and different new models of the Gyre.
With the AquaLink Controller Jebao already has one part of the Jebao ‘Jyre’ pump in place, and this copycat product could even be released ready to interoperate with aquarium controllers. A few of our trusted sources have said that they’ve actually seen a Jebao Gyre in person, but not necessarily working in an aquarium yet.
If the signs are to be believed, we only have to wait a couple weeks for the big CIPS pet show in China for the new Jebao Gyre pump knockoff to see the light of day. Even if the Gyre pump doesn’t get the Jebao Treatment next month, the efficacy of this new pump design will be hard for imitators to ignore so the release of a Gyre pump knockoff is not a question of ‘if’, it’s a question of ‘when’.
