A Newport Beach startup has drawn widespread publicity in tech circles for a Kickstarter campaign to bring the world’s smallest Bluetooth headset to market.
And nearly all of it is bad press.
That’s because So Special Labs LLC’s campaign, which raised $300,000 in less than two days, was taken down by the crowdfunding site for breaking at least one of the following rules: offering purchased items; presenting someone else’s work as one’s own; or misrepresenting or failing to disclose relevant facts about the project or its creator.
Backers will get their money back.
Labs cofounder Ivan Kan describes his company as an “idea incubator” and told the Business Journal that it worked with Chinese manufacturer Shenzhen EnJoYou Electronics Co. for 10 months to bring the Dot product to market.
Some backers, after being notified that Labs didn’t manufacture the prototype, took to Kickstarter to express their disapproval, even though Labs’ strategy is fairly common in the tech industry.
“Unfortunately, it’s run into some hiccups there, to say the least,” Kan said.
So he and business partner Jeffrey Maganis, who came across the product at a Hong Kong trade show, decided to take the campaign to Indiegogo, where it hasn’t raised the same ire.
Indeed, the product has attracted nearly $74,000 from about 800 backers—and another round of criticism from consumers who feel they’ve been duped.
Labs set out to raise $30,000 on Indiegogo.
It appears that Dot now will launch in the U.S., although Labs may not ultimately be the company that brings it to market because the manufacturer in China has been contacted by several other U.S. companies following the hubbub.
“It’s really hard to say what will happen,” Kan said.
Consider it a lesson learned for startups and backers who participate in the murky world of crowdfunding.
Toshiba Exec Heads Nonprofit
Toshiba America Business Solutions Inc. Vice President Tom Walter will serve as chairperson of the Florida-based Imaging Supplies Coalition for International Property Protection Inc. in June.
The appointment is his second with the nonprofit group, which aims to educate and protect consumers to combat counterfeiting and fraud in the imaging supplies industry.
He headed the group in 2007-08 that included Brother International, HP, Samsung Electronics America Inc., and Xerox, among others.
Irvine-based Toshiba America, a unit of Japan-based Toshiba Corp., has annual sales of about $1 billion.
Bits & Pieces
Irvine-based app and software maker DecisionPoint Systems Inc. sold a Georgia subsidiary to a pair of former employees for $650,000. CMAC Inc. specialized in consulting services for DecisionPoint, which is traded on the over-the-counter exchange and made the Business Journal’s fastest-growing private companies list in 2013. It had sales of $64.5 million last year. … Irvine-based startup Zadara Storage Inc. expanded its virtual private storage service to the Middle East and Africa through a distribution deal with IT services provider Orixcom Ltd., which has offices in Dubai, London and Dublin. The storage device maker, which splits its operation between OC and Israel, has raised $10 million since its 2011 inception.
