What’s Wrong With The Pebble’s CEO Eric Migicovsky New Kickstarter Campaign?

The Pebble’s visioner and an ultimate crowdfunding king (more than $45M raised) Eric Migicovsky has launched the PodCase for iPhone that charges the iPhone itself and Airpods.

Why is this project is going to fail miserably?

The team made the same mistakes that Concepter did a year back for its iblazr case, even more mistakes, actually. (Sad trombone)

In 2016 we launched a similar project that had very close funding numbers in first days. All the ideas behind the multifunctional iPhone battery cases lay in the lack of internal battery capacity, so the additional power source is required. Battery packs are often huge, so the phone case solves the problem in a more efficient way. Besides that, because of the rectangular battery design inside the case thfa space on the right side which is usually used for something new. The Podcase’s team has decided to integrate the AirPods charging place there.

So, what are the main points?

1. The battery cases market has fallen in demand. That’s why Mophie was sold to Zagg a few years ago. The new hardware becomes more energy-efficient, it simply does not drain the battery as before and the batteries itself become even bigger.
2. You should buy a new battery case for every phone upgrade, while the juice pack is always with you regardless of new releases.
3. Kickstarter projects are often delayed, so the backers become victims when they receive a long-awaited reward for the iPhone that got outdated. Podcase has tried to be on time before the new iPhone is being announced, and most likely considered to generate a second buzz wave after September 12th. So far, it’s so harder to sell people stuff they don’t really need.

But the campaign just started a day ago, why would it fail?

There’s a rule in crowdfunding — the product should raise at least 30% of the goal during the first 48 hours. Podcase raised 5% during first 24 hours knowing that all the big media already featured the product.

Aside from that, the team behind PodCase didn’t make a pre-launch campaign and didn’t build a community around the product, that would back it along the way. That’s why, it will be nearly impossible to raise the goal of around $300,000 (without cheating, of course)

That were strategic mistakes, as well mainly in the UX:

• Standard charging case of Apple Airpods also pairs the earbuds to devices. That means, it would be impossible to pair the earbuds to a new device using the PodCase or reconnect if you will get problems with the bluetooth
• The Smartphone is held in the pocket. When you will put that bulky case to the pocket, the fabric of your jeans likely will put Airpods off the case
• They made a sick plastic wall near the flash of the iPhone. This will spot your pictures at night and is made … of Apple guidelines, which might lead to the failure to get the MFI
• They use the USB Type-C, while Apple Charging case and Chinese cases use the lightning.

That’s it.

This was written because we want to place emphasis on the importance of hardware product strategy and market hypothesis tests before an actual launch. Our company made a number of hardware product launches and will be happy to assist other companies in product development so as not to repeat those same mistakes.

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