An up-and-coming drone company is proving it can swim with the sharks after earning a double punch funding opportunity on a popular VC reality show.
The ABC hit show Shark Tank invited xCraft to pitch both of the firm’s Kickstarter darlings — Phone Drone and the X PlusOne — on an episode that aired Friday, Oct. 23.
After the xPlusOne reached 300 percent of its Kickstarter goal, the producers of Shark Tank contacted founders JD Claridge and Charles Manning with an invitation to make their best pitch for top-tier funding.
“It was a new experience for me for sure,” Claridge told KLXY-TV. “Pitching the company to five billionaires on national television is kind of intimidating, but it was an exciting experience for sure.”
X PlusOne is a bi-wing hybrid drone prototype that can not only achieve hover stability but also has broken the 60 mph barrier.
“The patent-pending design incorporates several key elements that lend themselves to speed and efficiency without compromising VTOL performance,” Claridge told DRONELIFE. He added that the design achieves both by incorporating “a bi-wing lifting body configuration, lack of traditional flight control surfaces and novel refinements to the power plant/propeller configuration.”
The X PlusOne garnered 263 backers on Kickstarter who pledged $143,400 to help bring the project to life.
As if the X PlusOne hadn’t created a huge enough splash in the Shark Tank, the xCraft team carried an ace in the hole – the Phone Drone Ethos.
PhoneDrone Ethos is what its name implies – a drone that carries your smartphone as payload, allowing users to deploy their iPhone or Android phone as an autonomous aerial camera. Using a free flight planning app, the DronePhone follows its “master” on a virtual leash and can be programmed to fly specific altitudes, follow the user and stream video to another mobile device. While selfie drones are certainly not new to the drone scene, marrying a small UAV with a smartphone is a new trick. With 34 days remaining in its Kickstarter campaign, PhoneDrone Ethos has gathered almost $170,000 in pledges.
According to the Muse at Jezebel, the company presented the Sharks with “an ask of $500,000 for 20 percent of the company—valuing xCraft at $2.5 million” for production of the X PlusOne.
However, after the Sharks expressed interest in both the X PlusOne and the Phone Drone, Manning and Claridge raised the ask to a $10 million valuation — a Team xCraft double drone play.
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Just got this from xCraft. They have had our money, plus investment (as per your article). They promised me a refund BY the end of January…please read on because it looks like those demanding a refund are going to be let down badly.
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Posted by xCraft (Creator)
Backer3x For backers only
Backers,
Almost two and a half years ago, xCraft embarked on a journey to bring “powerful flying machines” to the masses. Not many take on the challenge of starting a business and bringing an entirely new product to market (twice) – but with your help we did! The ride has been one full of many highs and many lows. Two successful Kickstarter campaigns, a deal with all 5 Sharks on Shark Tank, bringing the X PlusOne to market, and landing distribution in big box retail. All big accomplishments and “highs” we have experienced. But there are also lows… missed delivery dates, deals that fall through, slow sales, layoffs, and broken promises. Not the cool, sexy part of startups, but reality none the less.
So, I am writing this update to fill you in on the “not so great” side of this journey. Nobody wants to hear bad news, and that is why we have been silent at times but you, our backers, deserve to hear. Who knows, maybe we can prevent one of you from falling into the same pitfalls or perhaps there is someone out there that can help us. Either way, we need to stick together and learn through the hard times.
Our primary challenge at present is a cash crunch related to our relationship with Best Buy. This is not public information but we feel it necessary to share with those who have helped us from the beginning. Please keep it confidential. We shipped a large order of product which Best Buy has only paid a very small portion of what is due. They are over 200 days late on payment and by all indications won’t be making any additional payments. This is very difficult for a small company to weather and has slowed essentially all operations at xCraft– R&D, manufacturing, shipping, marketing, customer service, – with the net effect of a late delivery for PhoneDrone. By our best estimate, we will be shipping PhoneDrone in early spring.
Many of you have asked about refunds. The truth is that the funds you pledged have already been used toward achieving the goal we are all trying to reach – delivering PhoneDrone. Use of funds included paying engineers and designers, constructing and testing prototypes, creating an app, building manufacturing tooling and so on. All very expensive. Unfortunately, our estimations of the cost to bring this product to market were woefully low. To fill the gap, we have already raised outside funds and are in the process of doing it again. We are doing it because we believe in this product and its potential and because you gave your hard-earned money to help make that dream come true.
There are many good things happening; we have a solid manufacturer, we have funding sources lined up, and we have new and exciting products “in the queue”. We will get there. Our resolve has only grown stronger in the face of these obstacles. But it will be much more difficult without our backers behind us.
So please, take a deep breath, renew your commitment to seeing a phone fly, and let’s do this together!
Sincerely,
-JD Claridge
CEO and Co-founder
xCraft