Kickstarter, PBC is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of February 2023, Kickstarter has received US$7 billion in pledges from 21.7 million backers to fund 233,626 projects, such as films, music, stage shows, comics, journalism, video games, board games, technology, publishing, and food-related projects.
A smartwatch is a portable wearable computer that resembles a wristwatch. Most modern smartwatches are operated via a touchscreen, and rely on mobile apps that run on a connected device in order to provide core functions.
Indiegogo is an American crowdfunding website founded in 2008 by Danae Ringelmann, Slava Rubin, and Eric Schell. Its headquarters are in San Francisco, California. The site is one of the first sites to offer crowd funding. Indiegogo allows people to solicit funds for an idea, charity, or start-up business. Indiegogo charges a 5% fee on contributions. This charge is in addition to Stripe credit card processing charges of 2,9% + $0.30 per transaction. Fifteen million people visit the site each month.
Pebble is a discontinued smartwatch developed by Pebble Technology Corporation based in Palo Alto, California that shipped from 2013 to 2016. A brainchild of Eric Migicovsky, funding was conducted through a Kickstarter campaign in 2012. It was the most funded project in Kickstarter history at the time, raising $10.3 million. Pebble watches can be connected to Android and iOS devices to show notifications and messages. An online app store distributed Pebble-compatible apps from many developers including ESPN, Uber, Runkeeper, and GoPro.
Lockitron is a device which can lock and unlock doors via remote control, typically via a smartphone. Starting with installations in 2010, it is one of the earliest examples of a smart lock. Lockitron was made by Apigy Inc., a start-up based in Mountain View, California. Apigy was a graduate of the Y Combinator start-up accelerator.
i.am+ is an American technology company based in Los Angeles, California. The company was founded by musician Will.i.am, an American singer and rapper known for being a member of the Black Eyed Peas, in 2013 with the mission of "creating wearable products that combine fashion and technology." In 2016, i.am+ acquired Israeli machine learning software company Sensiya, now known as over.ai.
The Ubuntu Edge was a proposed high-concept smartphone announced by Canonical Ltd. on 22 July 2013. Canonical was seeking to crowdfund a production run of around 40,000 units through Indiegogo. It had the highest target of any crowdfunded project to date, $32,000,000 over a one-month campaign. The Edge was not intended to go into mass production after the initial run, but rather to serve as a demonstration for new technologies for the industry. The Edge fell short of its funding goal, raising only $12,733,521 with 27,633 backers to purchase the standard model of the handset.
The Omate TrueSmart is a smartwatch designed by Omate, a Chinese company based in Hong Kong and Shenzhen. It has been funded by crowd funding via Kickstarter. The funding period was from August 21, 2013 until September 20, 2013. The funding goal of $100,000 was reached within 12 hours, with more than $1,032,000 raised by the end of the campaign. In contrast to other smartwatches, the Omate is a complete standalone telecom mobile device that can be used to make calls, navigate and use Android apps independent of the user's smartphone.
LIFX is a line of energy-efficient, multi-color, Wi-Fi enabled, digital addressable LED light bulbs that can be controlled via a Wi-Fi equipped device such as a smartphone or smartwatch.
Kreyos was a consumer electronics company based in San Francisco, California. The company intended to develop digital wearable devices fitted for people with active lifestyles. The Kreyos Meteor, the company's first product, started as a crowd funding campaign from Indiegogo. Although the campaign was funded to a bit more than fifteen times its original goal, the resulting product was poorly received, many units were not delivered or were defective, and the company was closed in 2014.
Bringrr is a startup company that develops and manufactures electronic tracking systems for commonly used items, including smartphones. The company was founded in 2009 by James Logan. The company's eponymous product is a device that alerts users if they do not have their smartphone when they start their car. Asheem Aggarwal is Bringrr's CEO.
Misfit, Inc. was a Redwood City, California-based consumer electronics company founded on 14 October 2011 by Sonny Vu, Sridhar Iyengar and John Sculley. It specialized in wearable technology that utilizes sensors and home automation products. Misfit's wearable activity trackers and count sleep, calories, and basic steps that can be synced to a mobile app on a compatible smartphone. Vu and Iyengar previously co-founded AgaMatrix, a company that made the iBGStar, the first FDA approved Smartphone medical device.
The Neptune Pine is an unlocked GSM standalone, full featured smartwatch developed by Canadian consumer electronics and wearable technology company Neptune. It was announced in January 2013 by Simon Tian and launched in November 2013 on Kickstarter. Within 27 hours, the campaign had reached its funding goal of $100,000, and ultimately went on to raise more than $800,000 in 30 days, becoming the highest-funded Canadian Kickstarter campaign at the time.
Nomad is a consumer electronics and lifestyle products company based out of Santa Barbara, California. Their products include leather phone cases, charging cables, portable battery packs, wireless chargers and travel accessories. Nomad began with its first products ChargeCard, ChargeKey and NomadPlus. Founded in 2012, they debuted on Kickstarter on July 18, 2012. In response to COVID-19, Nomad shifted their operations to produce PPE.
Hearables or smart headphones or earbuds are electronic in-ear devices designed for multiple purposes. The category is split between hearables for hearing health, and hearables for other applications.
Simon Tian is a Canadian businessman, inventor, entrepreneur and investor. He is the founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Fonus and Neptune. Born and raised in Montreal, Canada, Tian dropped out of pre-university college at the age of 17 to start Neptune, and, as of late 2017, has raised around $7 million from private investors as well as a total of more than $2 million from crowdfunding sources alone. Tian is a 2015 Thiel Fellow, having been awarded $100,000 by PayPal co-founder and venture capitalist Peter Thiel through the Thiel Foundation, and was named one of the top 30 Quebecers under 30 by Les Affaires in 2014.
Crowd Supply is a crowdfunding platform based in Portland, Oregon. The platform has claimed "over twice the success rate of Kickstarter and Indiegogo", and partners with creators who use it, providing mentorship resembling a business incubator.
Pine Store Limited, doing business as Pine64, is a Hong Kong–based organization that designs, manufactures, and sells single-board computers, notebook computers, as well as smartwatch/smartphones. Its name was inspired by the mathematical constants pi and e with a reference to 64-bit computing power.
Mobvoi Information Technology Company Limited is a technological company headquartered in Beijing, China that sells and develops consumer electronics and Chinese voice recognition, natural language processing, and vertical search technology in-house.
Unihertz is a Chinese smartphone manufacturer headquartered in Shanghai, China. The company makes mobile devices running Android OS, targeted at niche audiences utilizing design features such as physical keyboards, small form factors, dual-sided screens, massive-capacity battery, projector function, laser rangefinder and ruggedization.
