Canonical raised more than $12 million over 30 frantic days of crowdfunding its ambitious Ubuntu Edge superphone project, but it was still short some $20 million by the time the effort closed on Wednesday. The company’s target was $32 million. “We raised $12,809,906, making the Edge the world’s biggest ever fixed crowdfunding campaign,” wrote Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth in an announcement after the campaign ended. “Let’s not lose sight of what an achievement that is.”
Lets also not lose sight of the fact that despite raising $12 million, it also only achieved a little more than a third of its goal. To call that an achievement is debatable; and such obvious spin that it's almost laughable.
It also raises the question of whether Canonical expected - or even wanted - this campaign to succeed to begin with.
I can't help thinking this was simply a clever ploy created to generate buzz, get some market research done, and lean on hardware manufacturers. As such, I think it was deliberately priced so that there was only the slightest chance of this campaign actually reaching its funding goal.
As Mr. Shuttleworth said later in his statement, this campaign gave Canonical additional leverage when speaking to hardware manufacturers to get them to produce the Ubuntu phone.
He also mentioned the supposedly grass root evangelical movement that sprang up, and people who spent their own time and money getting the word out. (Sounds like Apple doesn't it? And Mark Shuttleworth soooo wants to be the 'new' Steve Jobs.)
Sorry. The way this played out it's all just a little too neat.
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Failed Funding Effort Blunts Canonical's Ubuntu Edge
Posted by: Richard Adhikari August 23, 2013 09:03 AMCanonical raised more than $12 million over 30 frantic days of crowdfunding its ambitious Ubuntu Edge superphone project, but it was still short some $20 million by the time the effort closed on Wednesday. The company’s target was $32 million. “We raised $12,809,906, making the Edge the world’s biggest ever fixed crowdfunding campaign,” wrote Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth in an announcement after the campaign ended. “Let’s not lose sight of what an achievement that is.”
It also raises the question of whether Canonical expected - or even wanted - this campaign to succeed to begin with.
I can't help thinking this was simply a clever ploy created to generate buzz, get some market research done, and lean on hardware manufacturers. As such, I think it was deliberately priced so that there was only the slightest chance of this campaign actually reaching its funding goal.
As Mr. Shuttleworth said later in his statement, this campaign gave Canonical additional leverage when speaking to hardware manufacturers to get them to produce the Ubuntu phone.
He also mentioned the supposedly grass root evangelical movement that sprang up, and people who spent their own time and money getting the word out. (Sounds like Apple doesn't it? And Mark Shuttleworth soooo wants to be the 'new' Steve Jobs.)
Sorry. The way this played out it's all just a little too neat.