Million Dollar Black Eye

MANY moons ago, there was a cigarette company, Taretyton, that ran ads stating "I'd rather fight than switch", with happy models with black eyes smoking THEIR favorite brand of cigarette. It was an incredibly catchy campaign with memorable images of black-eyed models, happy with their choice. Well, NOT so happy with their choice are the investors in a recent Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign that raised over $1M and has gone belly up. Now FintekNews is a HUGE fan of the crowdfunding genre, but it is NOT without risk, and investors need to know that when they go into these campaigns. Be involved, but buyer beware.

Cindy Taylor/Publisher

"The hard truth of crowdfunding is that campaigns fail all the time. Sometimes they never deliver, sometimes they deliver poorly. Usually you get something for your money either way, even if it's a partial refund or a subpar product. But every now and then there's a fail that just completely wipes out. Take the IndieGogo campaign for the PopSlate 2 phone case. Once a million-dollar crowdfunding darling, it's now bankrupt, and there are no refunds for the backers caught in the crossfire.

The PopSlate 2 was a compelling little package—an iPhone case complete with a backup battery and an e-ink screen for easy, low-battery reading. It's not a surprise that the IndieGogo campaign was able to raise $1,117,836 from 12,177 backers with perks like $99 for a case or $189 for a pair. The estimated ship date was July 2016, but the actual ship date is never as the project's most recent update confirms.

There is no way to sugarcoat what this all means:

  • popSLATE has entered into the legal process for dissolution of the company
  • Your popSLATE 2 will not be fulfilled
  • There is no money available for refunds
  • This will be our final update

The update goes on to explain the very basic causes of the project's failure: the "housing

material is not compatible with Apple OTA requirements," meaning the cases would not be able to work with iPhones as intended without a thorough and expensive reworking of the entire project. ..."

Read Full Article at PopularMechanics