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Drone Maker Lily Robotics Faked Promotional Video, Gets Sued For False Advertising and Misleading Business Practices (theregister.co.uk)
Dotnaught quotes a report from The Register: Lily Robotics says its decision on Thursday to shut down and return pre-order payments for a never-delivered drone, which came on the same day that San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon charged the company with false advertising and misleading business practices, was purely coincidental. According to a source familiar with the complaint filed against the company, Lily Robotics has known about the DA's investigation for several months. On the strength of a promotional video on YouTube in May 2015, embedded below, Lily Robotics raised more than $34 million in pre-order sales over the course of that year for a drone called Lily Camera. The flying gadget, when built, would be capable of being launched with a throw, following people, and recording them. But after pushing the delivery date back multiple times, Lily Robotics has yet to ship a single drone to its 60,000 prospective customers, according to the lawsuit filed against the company. In theory, Lily Robotics could face a fine of more than a hundred million dollars, depending upon the outcome of a trial, if it comes to that. The company faces potential fines for at least two business code violations subject to a civil penalty of $2,500 per violation, and there are some 60,000 individuals affected. In practice, however, such fines are usually orders of magnitude less, particularly if both sides agree on a settlement. The complaint against Lily, obtained by The Register, alleges that the company knowingly misled customers by creating a promotional video that purported to show video footage captured with a Lily drone prototype. "In fact, none of the video in the Promotional Video was shot by a Lily Camera," the complaint says. "Most notably, the POV footage used in the promotional video was filmed using a professional camera drone called the DJI Inspire." Among the Lily Camera prototypes present at the video shoot, the complaint says, the ones that could actually record video were able to do so because they had Go-Pro cameras mounted on them.
Lily Robotics said I can keep my doctor and the price would go down!
I wonder if they'd be interested in the design. It doesn't look nearly as nice as theirs, and is larger, but it does the job that theirs is supposed to do. How do I get in touch with them?
Liberty - Security - Laziness - Pick any two.
From the link in th OP.
The company's business practices give some suggestion as to its inability to meet promised shipping dates. According to a witness cited in the complaint, the company's online order system, which took email addresses and credit card numbers, did not ask for a shipping address in order to reduce signup "friction."
You can sue for Vaporware? extenze for men is going to be hearing from me!
It's part and parcel of the tech industry.
This makes me wonder if the owners of the company, the ones who received the funding either made off with it. Even if they got a salary that would be something livable in the Bay Area, they really have nothing to lose if Lily Robotics folds, other than a free paycheck.
Closing Lily Robotics won't do much. Actually having criminal trials and piercing the corporate veil might actually do something, especially if the entire thing was a complete fabrication and there were no plans to ever make this.
Lily Robotics is returning the money they took - which is an interesting supposition because I assume they've used some of the cash they were given for personal and business expenses...
That means that I suspect that they don't have the entirety of the $34 million to give back.
That also means that I think a $60m lawsuit is a WASTE OF TIME against a company that has neither cash nor assets to make a claim against.
The company would get a millions of dollar fine? Bad news for the ones that expected a partial refund: there will not be any money left.
In Soviet Canuckistan, we have these folks called police who lay criminal charges for things like fraud...
davecb@spamcop.net
I think that this is the crew I've seen out at Baylands Park in Sunnyvale, testing away. The drones seemed to by flying fine, but they were following dudes who were pretty much standing around in a field, not skiing or kayaking.
Weird, I kinda woulda figured that UCB robotics folks would be able to get this going, especially since the DJIs seem to be able to come pretty close to this already.
Lily just gave DJI and GoPro all the advertising they'll need for the next year because of this. GJ.
Yeah, it's risky trusting 20-year olds with no business experience, no supply chain experience, no operations experience, no customer service experience, no order fulfillment experience, etc. with $34 million + the $14 million they got from the dumbs hit VC. One would think the VC would have been able to provide more guidance to the student entrepreneurs. Hope everyone gets their money back.
Did anyone notice that three of the actors in that video were transgender? Lily Robotics deserves some recognition for their inclusiveness, even if their technology isn't quite ready yet... I, for one, applaud their courage and wish them well.
This says to me that seeing drag queens and the opposite (what do you call them?) in a promotional video is a reddish flag. A company that is playing to an irrelevant social attitude of potential customers may not have the ability to promote on legitimate grounds. IOW, pandering to gender-rights is sleazy when the issue is a drone's technical abilities.
But, personally, the video was an objectional promotion for other reasons. (I didn't notice the gender/sexual element.) It was asking for suckers without presenting any technical details. That's been done again and again already.
(||) Nehmo (||)
Hope everyone gets their money back
Why? People who fund long shot projects like this expect to lose it most of the time. That's how the game is played.
trans-gender is simply people trying to get the government to force others to go along with their lies. it's impossible to change genders because you can't change your chromosomes. it's just self-mutilation. just like the vet who now has prosthetic legs isn't suddenly a cyborg. sad, really.
I agree, but the analogy is bad.
Getting a prosthetic limb is inarguably a practical application of technology. Getting your genitals amputated may have psychological benefits to the subject, but anything beyond that is debatable.
(||) Nehmo (||)
In my opinion it is close to impossible to develop a good drone in San Francisco (or in the USA for that matter). There are so man useless regulations. It is practically impossible to fly.
The market leader, DJI, produces its vehicles in China.
Nearly 70,000 birds killed only in New York in attempt to clear safer path for planes https://www.theguardian.com/wo... , and birds fly all the time, not only couple of times on weekend. Birds also have no understanding comparable to a human pilot.
"Libtards"... those who use, such phrases show their ignorance. You obviously think Trump is some kind of messianic savior when in fact he is preordained for nothing more than bringing the entire country to its knees... no, I do not believe Russia was a major influence in the elections but I have no doubt that it was one of several factors, including a variety of voter frauds, plus MSM direction of public attention to Trump, giving him more media coverage than all the rest of the candidates combined. MSM turned the election into a carnival sideshow, and it will cost this country dearly. Unlike you, AC, I signed my name to this comment... being the coward you are you will never have to suffer the embarrassment of your terrible judgement of Trump--- but I sufficiently confident in my assessment of your Messiah that you see my name above--- mark my words: Trump will be the most disastrous POTUS ever, and you and the other Trump supporters will have to live with that forever.
Gets Sued For False Advertising and Misleading Business Practices... better watch out MacDonalds and Burger King: your burgers bear no resemblance to size and quality of those shown in television advertising and in-store signage.