It takes more than hype and a good idea to make a good product. At least that's what Lockitron - the "revolutionary" door lock - has discovered.
Eighteen months after order, and after multiple delays, Lockitron is still not shipping in quantity.
There have been a few hundred units shipped, but almost all of those have been fraught with problems ranging from jamming, network unreliability, or short battery life. The company's blog details several painful iterations where product shipped to several end users, was installed, then was recalled and had to be factory reworked. See the factory image detailing this rework below:
We ordered our test unit in 10/2012 (during the initial crowdfunding campaign), paid for it a year later in 10/2013, and have not seen it yet despite an estimated ship date two months ago:
Lockitron is pressing ahead, and claims it almost has all the bugs worked out. However, the klutziness so far shows that $2.3 Million and a hyper-enthusiastic crowd of early backers does not guarantee success.