PopSLATE Before Shark Tank
Yashar Behzadi was tired of unlocking his phone over a hundred and fifty times a day. He thought that using your smartphone to get information could be a lot more efficient. He figured that they could streamline the process by doing the work for the user themselves. He also realized that the back of smartphones we’re going virtually unused. Yashar combined the two ideas, and the popSLATE was created.Before appearing on Shark Tank, the entrepreneur behind popSLATE started an Indiegogo campaign. The campaign raised an impressive million dollars in March of 2016. Will the Sharks see these results, and invest in this Innovative new product? Let’s take a look.
PopSLATE on Shark Tank
He claimed that the always-on screen would allow the consumer to have instant access to everything they wanted. Those features included calendars, to-do list, recipes, Maps, and text messages. All those features would be available at a glance. He claimed that you would never again have to fumble around for your boarding pass. Yashar said that it was the 24/7 feed of information that you want whether it’s news or your favorite sports updates. Yashar finished his presentation by asking the sharks who wanted to help him bring the popSLATE to the back of everyone’s smartphone.
Robert asked what happened to the front screen of the phone. Yashar explained that it remained completely off, which allowed the customer to go without unlocking it while still getting vital pieces of information. Lori asked for samples, and Yashar went behind his display to grab them for her. Robert asked if it could function as a dual screen, and Yashar said that you could have both on at the same time. Yashar passed out samples to each of the sharks. Each sample featured a picture of the shark. Yashar et them know that by pressing a button on the side of the popSLATE, they could cycle through different images, including the Sharks favorite quotes.
Ashton Kutcher, who is the guest shark on the show, asked how the popSLATE worked. Yashar let him know that it was an e-paper screen. That technology allowed it to be super low power, while also being readable. The popSLATE connected wirelessly to the phone. Ashton clarified that you set everything up on the front sides applications, and that’s what delivered it to the popSLATE. Yashar confirmed that that was the case. Robert wanted to know what made the popSLATE valuable to the consumer. Yashar said that it saves the customer time, and everyone on the Shark Tank knew that time was money. Mark asked how much he was selling the popSLATE for, and Yashar told him that they were retailing for $129. Mark followed up by asking him how much it cost to make, and he told them that it was in the $80 price point Yashar hastily said that they had received quotes for $41 from the manufacturer if they are ordering bulk.
Lori asked him how much the tooling cost for each phone. Yashar let her know that it was $51,000 for each cycle. Lori looked shocked and told him that figuring out production for each different kind of phone would be expensive. Yashar told her that they were focusing on Apple products and the iOS at the moment. Kevin asked how much money they had lost in the production of the popSLATE. Yashar told him that they had spent 1.9 million dollars and development. Kevin followed up by asking him how soon they thought they would break even. Yashar said that they would be cash flow positive in July of next year.
Robert said that he love technology, and had been in the technology business for a long time. He stated that it was a beautiful design, and stated that he thought the technology would be more adaptable to wearables. Yashar indicated that he didn’t see himself competing with the wearables. He stated that the wearables we’re good for small pieces of information such as text messages, but for anything bigger, it was a terrible user experience. Mark jokingly said that Dick Tracy would argue with him. Robert went out, saying that he still thought that everything the popSLATE did could be served by a wearable.
Mark told Yashar that the lock screen was really his competition, not the wearable. Lock screens on phones were becoming more and more powerful. Notifications are getting stronger, and people were using a lot of screams for more and more things. He needed to come up with something more exciting, and the popSLATE had the potential to be that. Mark mentions that the popSLATE had the potential to bring up the pictures of friends that you walked into a party with, or something like that. Yashar said that they would be able to build something that was to that point. He said that the significant advantage of the popSLATE is that the screen is always on which would be used to serve information. He said that it could be utilized as a Mavericks game to help relevant information as the match is going on, or if it’s walking into a store and getting a coupon. Mark continued, saying that it’s a very binary space and popSLATE would have to be configured to win.
Kevin said that it was a land grab for the accessory, so they would be left with what remains after that. Ashton pointed out that if the smartphone’s decided to put out their own second screen. Kevin said that he thought that we’re headed in that direction. Ashton stated that the main problem would be battery life. Kevin tried to tell them that the popSLATE would have a battery issue as well, but Ashton pointed out that the battery life for an e-reader was much longer than a standard smartphone. Kevin said that they were still debating the direction of the business, and they hadn’t even touched the valuation. He said that the Sharks didn’t agree, and that made the business risky. He didn’t think that the risk-reward was there for him, and he went out.
Lori asked Yashar what he was doing to drive the price down. HR and said that he was trying to be lower priced, and he said that the Sweet Spot would be $99. Lori stated that she’d sold millions of dollars worth of cell phone cases. She called it a great market, and something that was growing and growing. She said that the downside is that they would never be catching up because cell phones were always getting bigger and bigger, a new one were coming in every year. So just as you get inventory in, the market would be changing, and you have to come up with something else. She pointed out that the tooling is extremely expensive for each production. Lori went out.
Yashar let her know that he appreciate what she was trying to say, and new the top so it was very early in production. Kevin pointed out that he had two sharks left. Ashton stated that he liked the platform, and the software side was the most compelling point because they have the ability to use Bluetooth to actually broadcast whatever they wanted to program into the application. He’s afraid that they had a dependency on Apple because they are only working with iOS right now. He also said that the price point was too high, and he couldn’t get over those hurdles. He went out.
Mark said that IOS was just going to keep on improving its design, allowing the lock screen to get smarter and adding multi-window capability. He didn’t think that popSLATE became as critical or as compelling. Mark one out. Mark was the last shark standing, so the presentation was over. Robert said that Yashar did an excellent job of explaining what his product was. Yashar stated that he understood, and then he was still very early in this space. He thought the Sharks for their time and said that it’s been wonderful. As he walked off stage, he stated that he was disappointed that he didn’t get the money but appreciated the opportunity to talk about his product. Back on the Shark Tank, Kevin looked down at his popSLATE with the picture on it and said it was a damn good-looking case. Lori rolled her eyes. Let’s see how popSLATE did without getting a deal from the Sharks.
PopSLATE Now in 2018 – The After Shark Tank Update
“Since the Shark Tank appearance, popSLATE has gone under heavy renovations. There is a new second screen available called the popSLATE 2, which was entirely funded by Indiegogo. ”
You do realize that the Popslate 2 was launched _before_ the Shark Tank appearance, right?
December 31st – no case – emails – looks like we all got took.
Hi Don, see my latest post. There has to be something we can do! And ideas?
Regards
Nigel
Whenever they launched doesn’t matter, they still haven’t delivered P2 and they are not returning messages. They continue to put out delay emails, now supposedly it will be delivered in dec 2016, yet nothing. Maybe the sharks were right? I will update when I get mine….
Yes, i agree with you.
My point is that this piece made it sound like Popslate accomplished something, when in fact the company is running out of money.
Nate, see my latest post, there has to be something we can do. Any ideas?
Regards
Nigel
Hi Curtis, see my latest post. There must be something we can do. Any ideas?
Regards
Nigel
Hi, is it about to be delivered as per your last update, it’s been 28 months since I bought my iPhone 6 Plus and 20 months since placing and paying for my Popslate. You can only say your going to do something so many times. Surely you haven’t failed this crucial deadline.
It’s just that I haven’t received any communication from you as per your despatch procedures. Where you request my postal address so you can send me my purchase. Which suggests that nothing is going to be received and another story is being put together in an attempt to validate why you have failed yet again.
I think some communication to your more than patient customers is about due, DONT
YOU?????
Nigel UK Customer
Last Message, still have not received my PopSlate or had any reply. It’s absolutely disgraceful. Surely Idieago the funding agents should look into this on all of our behalfs.
Here’s my last communication to PopSlate:
No reply to my post. Must mean it’s not being posted in December 2016 ordered and paid for in 2015. Maybe just maybe it may arrive 2017.
No updates, No Communication, No Excuses.
I may start believing others and have to agree that this could be a Scam. Makes me sad to say it after all the waiting and support I have given the PopSlate product and its inventors. A sad end to a stuff 2016.
I’m frustrated myself. They have my money and by all looks of it are not going to deliver the product. certainly they are late. all of this stinks.
Hi, see my latest post. There must be something we can do. Have you any ideas?
Regards
Nigel
the company does not seem to want to respond to direct enquiries. very frustrating.
Well it’s now the 22nd January 2017. No replays to my numerous emails and enquiries as to what us happening. I can no longer find any info that is current on PopSlate or PopSlate 2.
They have completely disapeared or gone to ground, the last info from them was back in October 2016 when they had failed to send out any product, yet again. Then we had the mid December promised delivery. Read Below:
popSLATE 2 product & shipping update
Hi, folks:
There have been notable developments over the last couple of weeks, and we wanted to provide a detailed update to ensure everyone has the latest information. We encourage everyone to read through everything and reach out with additional questions.
As you can see, the product architecture is pretty complex, but the payoff is a very slender device that powers the rich set of popSLATE 2 features.
6 & 7 fulfillment timelines
Our plan had been to start shipping at the end of this month October 2016, However, this plan has been derailed by a critical power management issue that surfaced during testing in the last couple of weeks. Namely, popSLATE was not reliably delivering 2 amps to the iPhone for charging, which was leading to unpredictable and overly long phone charge times. This issue was caused by intermittent resetting of the power management IC. To fix the problem, we have reworked the power circuitry by introducing an additional hot-swap IC, which will then require an additional iteration of build-out and product testing. As a result, the delivery date for the 6-series product will be delayed to the second half of December.
For those of you who have upgraded to the 7 series, the design path for the new model is now very clear. The vast majority of our design will carry-over from the 6 (all electronics, most of the mechanical aspects), but we must reposition the display module and re-route some of the circuitry at the bottom of the phone. This redesign will also require new tooling for manufacturing, and we will begin work following the 6 series delivery, so we anticipate delivery of the 7-series product in late-February.
Finally, we know that this news is very frustrating. Please understand that we hate a delay as much as you do. We are delivering a product that combines the features of a smartwatch, battery pack, and e-reader into a single device—arguably one of the most sophisticated mobile accessories ever conceived. While we have attempted to mitigate as many issues as possible, unexpected challenges do come with the territory. We apologize for the delay, and we are working night & day to get you your popSLATE as quickly as possible.
Thanks a lot for your ongoing patience and support.
Yashar & Greg
Co-founders
popSLATE
So there you have it from the founders mouths, well we have been here betore and we are there again. Is there anyone out there who can help? Is there anything we can do? Can the plethora of Gadget Publications take it up on our behalf? Some of these publications are still running positive advertisements from PopSlate for the 7 Series of iPhones. Who is paying for those advertisements, or are you being duped too?
Come on The World Wide Web help us needed!! Get on board and help us to get after them and the answers we deserve. There are literally hundreds of us who have paid up front and to date have had nothing. If nothing else, there’s a story in there somewhere that the media could and should run with. After all they promoted there vision which hooked us all in.
Help Please
Kind Regards
Nigel
I paid for a Popslate 2 last April, and haven’t received so much as an email from the vendors. I have sent several to them, all unanswered. Anyone interested in a class action lawsuit?
We all were just told today they went belly up- $ was gone, and we would not be getting a product or a refund. This was just a huge scam. They got over a million dollars to produce 12000 products (number of backers) and supposedly their working prototype suddenly failed apple tests and screen tests. This company- popslate is a piece of excrement. How do you start a class action suit?
They just announced that popSLATE ran out of money, couldn’t get funded by anyone, and have entered into dissolution as a company. To the point where they won’t even be refunding Indiegogo contributors. Please update this article to reflect how stinky they are.
Announced that POPSLATE is FRAUD and stile millions from all of the supporters.