Crowdfunding. Ideas that may have once seemed like a pipe dream are becoming more and more of a reality with crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter, Fundable and Indiegogo. These companies are responsible for some of the biggest and most popular (not to mention coolest) projects coming out right now and in the past few years. Literally, if someone can dream up a project that gets people interested –their dreams can become a reality. These sites have moved “crowdfunding” from a trendy buzzword to a mainstream fundraising model. They have created a way to get projects in front of people who probably never would have seen them and given those people the opportunity to make the ideas a reality.

To date, the current Kickstarter Stats:

$1,089,744,046 – total dollars pledged to Kickstarter projects

60,738 – successfully funded projects

6,068,307 – total backers 

1,805,213 – repeat backers

14,872,488 – total pledges

There are some huge crowdfunding successes right now. In fact, there are probably several big products coming out right about now that many don’t even know started with crowdfunding.

Here are a few crowdfunding successes that we’re interested in right now and that we think will lead to (and have already led to) other projects by spin off ideas:

 

Elevation Lab: Elevation Dock
Elevation Lab has received huge press and accolades from everyone from Wired and Gizmodo to Forbes and the New York Times with their successful iPhone dock projects. Now they are back with an Elevation Dock for iMac and Apple displays. They haven’t even reached their deadline and they’ve already raised triple their goal. Amazing. The Elevation Dock is a stand for iMac of Apple displays that raises your monitor for better posture and boasts a sturdy and clean aesthetic.
Touchfire Keyboard
The Touchfire Keyboards are another huge kickstarter success story from the recent few years. These keyboards fit over iPads (and now iPad mini, Air, and 2-4). The keyboard magnetically attaches transparent 3D keys on top of the iPad’s 2D keyboard. The original Touchfire Keyboard was funded as a Kickstarter project back in 2011 –it became the most funded tablet-related Kickstarter project of it’s time.
The Lunecase
The Lunecase is the first intelligent iPhone cover, but it’s not that simple. This case receives notifications from the iPhone powered by electromagnetic energy. All electronic devices give off this energy –the case simply picks up that energy and converts it (translation: doesn’t drain phone’s battery). Lunecase knows when a call or text message is coming in before it even notifies you on the iPhone screen. The case notifies you by displaying the notifications on the back of your smartphone with the help of LEDs, using the free energy that is emitted by the device. There is no battery or electricity in the case; it’s just running off the phone’s energy. Pretty amazing, huh?
Pebble Watch
The Pebble Watch is huge right now. In fact, we’ve talked about it before. This watch works apps from your iPhone and Android to give you instant notifications of calls, emails, app alerts, etc. via the display on the watch’s digital face. What’s more is that it has a design that people actually want to wear. It was also a huge crowdfunding success by earning $1 million of support in only 28 hours on Kickstarter. It eventually went on to raise more than $10 million.

For every project I can share with you, there are ten more on the rise and equally as successful.  Many tech trends, new products, and ideas that we’ve shared here on the website have originated as crowdfunding projects.  Products like Coin, Oculus Rift, and the Pebble Smart Watch were all started by crowdfunding.There have certainly been doubts about the potential of crowdfunding in the past, but now it is a very real reality producing very real results that are changing the world.  

What are the biggest crowdfunding projects that you’ve got your eye on right now?  Any that you think have huge potential?