Ottawa’s Blacksumac has raised over three times its original goal on crowdfunding website Indiegogo.
By Jacob Serebrin
The company launched its funding campaign in late August, hoping to raise $100,000 through pre-sales of its Piper home security system. The company reached that goal in early September and by the time the campaign ended, just before midnight on Friday, Blacksumac had raised over $300,000. Around $150,000 in pre-sales were made in the final four days of the campaign.
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The Piper is a camera-equipped home security and automation device that sends security alerts directly to a user’s smartphone or tablet.
The company chose to launch a crowdfunding campaign, rather than release its product through more traditional channels, as a way to pre-sell the device months earlier than it could through any other method.
“It’s a good feeling,” Russell Ure, the company’s president and co-founder, told OBJ shortly after reaching the $100,000 goal. “We set out in this campaign to get validation.”
Blacksumac has said the additional funds will allow it to include additional home automation features with the device.