Spinn, the grind and brew centrifugal coffee machine that is nearly two years past its original ship date, has raised an additional $3 million in funding that it plans to use to ramp up production of its coffee maker.
The funding announcement came as part of an update to early buyers via the company’s community forum. The update indicated that the funding comes from a “Swiss strategic investor” and that it will be used to invest in engineering and production teams and to produce the coffee machine in volume. Combined with past funding, the new round brings Spinn’s total funding to approximately $10 million.
From the post:
“…we raised another $3M from a Swiss strategic investor for the continued expansion of the engineering and manufacturing team, investment in the production lines and tools to produce Spinn machines in large quantities. The investment allows us to proceed with our operations and we are confident we’ll deliver something unique and valuable to our early backers and future customers.”
Earlier this month, I had written about the company’s long delay and how those who had purchased the machine early via the company’s website were getting restless as the company continued to market it and push their coffee marketplace. Because the company has been actively hawking its coffee via social media and email marketing, it’s totally within character then that the funding news was part of a larger announcement in which the company indicated it would also provide Spinn customers with a free annual membership to their coffee subscription service, Spinn Primo.
Reaction to the subscription offer from early Spinn customers still waiting for their coffee machine amounted to one of a collective eyeroll. As one commenter wrote, “I am not using the Spinn Marketplace yet because I do not have a coffee maker other than one that uses pods.” Another wrote, “Would love to have the free coffee if I had a coffee maker to make it in!”
For these customers and others (such as myself), the good news is that with the new cash infusion, the likelihood of Spinn shipping its coffee machine suddenly seems a lot higher than it did just a month ago. As they indicate in the update, the company still has a significant number of things on the to-do list : more engineering, acquisition of tooling for mass production, purchasing of parts inventory to name a few.
The arrival of external funding also relieves pressure to push the sale of new orders to fund investment in further engineering and production. Up until recently, the company had continued to sell products at a perpetual discount. This month, the same month the news of the funding arrived, the company went to full pricing for new products for what appears to be the first time.
The bad news? The company still hasn’t given a firm timeline for when the Spinn will ship. However, Spinn has indicated another update is forthcoming this month, so, hopefully, it will let us know when we might see the grind and brew coffee maker.
Finally, more funding is no guarantee of a finished product. We’ve seen a number of high-profile hardware startups (in food and beyond) go out of business over the past few years as they struggle to bring products to market. We’ll be keeping a close eye on Spinn to see if this new funding is enough to push the product across the finish line and get it out to backers.
And this means they are still developing and engineering machine, so its nowhere near mass production and the earliest it will be shipped will be second half of 2019
will never ship. Company will fold. Machine wont live up to hype. 6 month warranty humbug. get your money back before its too late.
I got my refund almost 2 years ago now. I was one of the first people to pre-order and one of the first to realize nothing was going to happen soon if ever. Hope you all get a refund.
I did settle on a BDC650BSS. I tried others and that is the one that fit my needs best. I also set up a micro bot button pusher so i can automate things better. I have a little jar for the ground near the device and hacked it to get constant water. When the coffee is done I just empty the grounds while while stirring with the other.
I wish I had a spin that automated things a bit more, but I live in reality.
I’m getting really nervous. The machine I chose is now $655 retail and I paid 399 plus shipping- this means they’re ‘losing’ 250 per machine for the first several (hundred?) thousand? Seriously I should just give it up after 2 years. There was one company that is actually making their item (a mug of some sort) that took so damn long that when I finally realized I never got mine and wrote to them (and called) I got zero response to the point of ignorance. After reading their bs for years the horror of watching them ‘steal’ my money like that (and this is now a company that sells to big retail) makes me sick. I truly hope this is not the same outcome.