Even as the world eagerly anticipates the arrival of the Apple Watch this April, other smartwatch makers are gearing up for a fight — including one that set a new record Tuesday.
Pebble’s new Pebble Time smartwatch raised $1 million in under an hour on crowdfunding platform Kickstarter Tuesday. The Pebble Time, which has a new color screen and a battery life of up to seven days, is the fastest Kickstarter project to hit the million-dollar mark.
The new @Pebble project is the fastest ever to raise $1MM. The previous record-holder raised that amount in 2 hours and 41 minutes.
— Justin Kazmark (@jkaz) February 24, 2015
The new @Pebble project is the fastest ever to raise $1MM. The previous record-holder raised that amount in 2 hours and 41 minutes.
— Justin Kazmark (@jkaz) February 24, 2015
The Pebble Time Kickstarter project will continue raising money for another month, meaning it could become one of the most-funded Kickstarter projects ever by the time it’s done. Pebble’s Kickstarter success isn’t entirely surprising: The company launched its first smartwatch on the platform three years ago and has since been a darling of the community there ever since.
Kickstarter will also get a nice boost from the Pebble Time’s success: The crowdsourcing platform takes 5% of total funds raised for successful projects plus payment processing fees.