Can WooHoo Be a World Class Product for $60,000?

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Jan 12, 3:45PM EST · Published Jan 19, 6:25AM EST

Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

One of the most hyped projects on Kickstarter, the online small man’s VC, is WooHoo, a device that its parent, SmartBeings, says will make a home into a “smart home.” One problem with the project, which is being promoted by a PR agency called The Crowdfund Mafia (seriously), is that it has raised only $58,630 from 358 backers. It would test the imagination to believe that this sum would come even close to funding the ambitious project in its early stages, let alone get to market with one that is so complex. There may be investment dollars that management does not talk about.

The project describes itself this way on Kickstarter:

WooHoo™’s Artificial Intelligence based and interactive smart hub is the world’s first affordable and easy to use smart home solution.

How advanced is the product?

WooHoo speaks the language of your smart devices as well as yours. Just ask WooHoo, and it will turn on lights, control the temperature , lock the doors, create to-do lists and remind your mom to take the pills …

[nativounit]

Artificial intelligence is a term that is thrown around a great deal. One would think to build a complex device that utilizes AI would cost more than $60,000. SmartBeings admits at much at the bottom of its very long WooHoo funding page on Kickstarter. Some of the project may have been funded by management and directors so far, but the success of WooHoo, according to a timeline, is based on two “stretch goals” that total $750,000. Kickstarter participants in the funding will get a WooHoo in May or June.

Why should Kickstarter investors put money into WooHoo now, beyond that is a belief in the project’s success?

Becoming a backer means that you’ll get exclusive discounts and prices that we’ll never offer again. It also means that you’ll be the first to receive and enjoy WooHoo Smart Hub, months ahead of its availability in retail.

Once it is launched, WooHoo should be able to compete, based on SmartBeing’s description, with products like Amazon’s Alexa and Google Home.

SmartBeings says that WooHoo was born in Silicon Valley. That makes a difference.

[wallst_email_signup]

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.