From the SEC filing:
Knightscope operates on a Machine-as-a-Service (MaaS) business model. We charge clients an average price of $7 per hour per
machine, which we believe compares favorably to a human guard or mobile vehicle patrol unit. We sign year-long contracts with our clients.
At such a price point, running an ADM 24/7 can generate over $61,000 in annual revenue per machine. Although initial sales
were made directly to clients, we have also started to sell through our channel partners, Allied Universal and Securitas, two of the three largest private security firms in the United States, with whom we have entered into master service agreements.
Here’s one of the founders, Stacy Stephens:
While the other founder, William Santana Li, was the youngest executive ever at Ford Motor Company. Mr Li has been heavily involved in development of law enforcement vehicles, and he built a “world-class advisory board comprised of senior officials that had worked directly for 3 different U.S. Presidents”.
Interviewed by the U.S.A. Today, Mr Li discusses just how important he says his robots are:
“Do you feel violated by the ATM machine, or by a guard frisking you at a sporting event?” he asks, leaning forward. “I’ll tell you what puts people on edge, getting shot at.”
From the same interview, Mr. Li says that having a job in security is miserable, and he would just as well replace all of them:
The other specter raised by the K5 is job destruction, at least at the level of private security officers. Li counters that these are “miserable jobs with turnover of 400%,”and suggests that perhaps its time to turn those shifts over to robots.
Finally, in an interview with the American Society for Industrial Security (ASIS), Senior Regional Vice President of ASIS and President of Setracon Enterprise Security Risk Management Services Jeffrey A. Slotnick recently spoke about the role of technology in the wake of the Las Vegas Shooting:
Stowell: What are the barriers that have prevented organizations from investing in this type of technology and integrating it into their physical security systems?
Slotnick: That’s the big question–showing value for security. People are reticent to invest in technologies that they don’t know about, or they find out about, and want to make sure it’s not the latest flavor of the day. And our ability as security professionals to make the business case. Look at the expense Mandalay Bay [Resort and Casino] is going through now. I don’t know what the cost of these shot-spotting units are, but they’re Wi-Fi enabled, they’re integrated. I imagine it would have been significantly less than what the hotel is having to spend presently.