Kickstarter project of ultra small aerial drone "ZANO" collected more than 400 million turned out to have been torn down

A palm-sized miniature aerial drone called "Europe's largest Kickstarter project" gathered over 15,000 orders from more than 12,000 investors worldwideZANOIt turned out that the project of "I was torn down." In the campaign for Kickstarter, which was closed in January 2015,£ 2.3 million (about 425 million yen)It was a project that had contributions of things, but its poor end was also revealed.

Kickstarter's Zano drone fails to fly - BBC News
http://www.bbc.com/news/34787404

After raising record $ 3.4 M on Kickstarter, UK drone startup collapses | Ars Technica
http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/11/after-raising-record-3-4m-on-kickstarter-uk-drone-startup-collapses/

Europe's biggest Kickstarter has gone bust after raising $ 3.6 million | The Verge
http://www.theverge.com/2015/11/19/9759834/zano-drone-bankrupt-liquidation-kickstarter

On 11th November 2015, British · BBC told the resignation of the Torquing group CEO Ivan Reedman, who has led the ZANO project, and reported that the ZANO project took over the reef. For that reason BBC tells us that Mr. Reedman himself said it was "personal health problem and unrealizable discord".

ZANO is an aerial shoot drone that will be the smallest size even for many drunks that are on the market. The details are described in detail in the following article, but ZANO is a model that can be said as "self-shot drone" with built-in high-quality camera, many functions such as aerial photographing by automatic tracking are possible by linking with smartphone It was said to be there.

The camera can be adjusted with a smartphone and equipped with automatic follow-up mode and the best compact and lightweight drone "ZANO" for "self-shooting" - GIGAZINE


In Kickstarter, it was said to be "near completion" and ZANO was explained that production will begin as soon as the deadline of January 2015 reached, but from the beginning that progress was continuous and postponed. The BBC was visiting the Torquing Group headquarters in August and was interviewed, but at that time it was clear that the project was on a serious reef.

In the case of the interview, we actually skipped the ZANO and the aerial shooting was done, but the flight stability was very low even after 7 months from the deadline, and the movie shot was also very low image quality It was said that it was. Mr. Reedman explained that this problem will be solved by updating the software and said he is doing his utmost to deliver the product to the investor quickly.

Although ZANO shipment actually started after that, the actual number of shipments shipped to over 15,000 units remained at only 600 units. Problems of flight performance and image quality that were concerned have not been solved, and not only a number of functions such as "automatic tracking function" are actually not realized at all but most functions are in the "concept" stage The actual situation which was stayed became clear.

In this real situation, opinions from disbelievers are showing disappointment and voices of anger. On the page of ZANO on Facebook, comment on anger that "I want you to return money, I want to put that money on a flying drone", "Follow Me" mode, "Hold position" mode, gesture control, return function ... ... These Everything was told on the Kickstarter's page, but how far has it been realized? ", There are some voices of doubts that the explanation and actual condition of the product are not in complete engagement.

ZANO


In addition, criticism has also been raised that shipments were prioritized to those ordered by product preorders, as opposed to many Kickstarter investors. Needless to say, the investment has gathered in Kickstarter, not to mention that the project of ZANO has come true, and it is undeniable that it is also the Kickstarter campaign that pre-orders became possible. Regardless of giving priority to actual orders, some investors said that they were severely criticized as "fraud is just as good".

According to Kickstarter 's Terms of Service, "Creator has a responsibility to realize the content that was committed in the project, and if the agreement content is not realized, it will receive legal action by the investor" It is.

Kickstarter


The risk of such a problem is inevitable because cloud funding including Kickstarter is "investment in products", but it is said that the explanation in advance contained incorrect contents It seems likely that the location of the responsibility may be questioned. For the ZANO project which is considered to be the largest in Europe, the aftermath of the future seems to be big.