Plastc Took $9 Million In Preorders For A Smart, All-In-One Credit Card Then Went Bankrupt
THIS IS WHY WE CAN'T HAVE NICE THINGS
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​On Thursday, Plastc — one of a handful of companies attempting to make smart cards that digitally hold payment information for multiple credit and debit accounts — announced that it was ceasing operations with plans to file for bankruptcy. Plastc had taken $9 million in preorders from 80,000 customers as of October 2016. According to an announcement posted on Plastc's website, "we will not be able to fulfill any pre-orders.

Here's a look back on the promising rise, troubled growth, and inglorious fall of Plastc.

October 2014: Plastc Launches With Big Promises

Plastc began accepting preorders in fall 2014 with a promise to begin shipping cards to backers the following summer. The company told journalists that it was packing a ton of technology into a tiny package.

The card is tricked out with an E-Ink touchscreen, which shows name, credit card, barcodes and other information. With a swipe and tap users can change their card from a credit or debit card to a rewards card, thanks to the card's rewriteable magnetic strip. The card also has a rewriteable NFC/RFID technology that lets the card mimic any RFID access cards.

For consumers, there's a $155 charge to purchase the card, but Plastc has managed to pack a lot of really amazing features in its card-shaped box.

[TechCrunch]


Plastc launched with a slickly produced commercial that made the smart card sound like an existing product that people were already using.

 YouTube

Plastc wasn't the first company promising an all-in-one smart card. As many early articles about Plastc mentioned, it was following in the footsteps of Coin, a company that had begun a crowdfunding campaign almost a year earlier but hadn't yet begun distributing its product by the time Plastc arrived on the scene.

Last November, Coin offered a first taste of what was possible. The device promised to digitally hold eight credit or debit cards and let you choose between them at will. You could swipe Coin in any conventional card reader, and it would notify you if it had been lost or stolen using Bluetooth. Coin would have a two-year battery life, and a companion app that could hold your coupons and ID cards. But Coin still hasn't shipped.

Today, we're getting a second take at the "card tech" category with Plastc, which manages to bundle twice as many features into the same svelte form factor.

[The Verge]


Due in part to Coin's setbacks, some tech journalists were skeptical of Plastc's grandiose ambitions from the very beginning.

Sound great? Of course it does! Almost too good to be real; that is a lot of tech to squeeze into one, tiny, credit card-sized device. The dream is enticing, but we'll have to wait a while to see if it will come true. 

[Gizmodo]


August 2015: Plastc Promises To Ship Its Product To Backers In April 2016

After missing its goal of delivering in summer 2015, Plastc promised in an email to backers to ship on April 29, 2016.

February 2016: Plastc Delays Ship Date Yet Again To Summer 2016

According to an email to backers that was posted on Reddit, Plastc CEO Ryan Marquis told pre-order customers, "We are getting very close!"

We have made tremendous progress and are excited to share our latest with you. You are our loyal and valued customers, and you deserve to know the realities that we face every day. You will see the successes as well as the challenges that we encounter while bringing a product of this caliber to market. Updates will come through social channels, blog posts and email. That is a promise, from me to you.

The Big Question:

When will Plastc Card ship? While we have made great progress, we will be delayed beyond our April 29, 2016 ship date. Based on our current development and production forecast our new shipping timeline is August-September 2016. If this changes, you will be informed immediately, whether the date is closer or farther away.

[Reddit]


One blogger responded to the new delay by suggesting that others "approach this product with tremendous skepticism":

As for shipping dates, Plastc has a history peppered with a few inaccurate promises. They're latest update says that Pre-orders will start shipping April 29th Summer 2016, however they have been known to miss stated deadlines by a few days in the past, so we'll see if that holds up.

[Wefty and Mash]


Late 2016: Even More Delays

In October, reporter Bob Sullivan took a critical look at Plastc and other smart card purveyors and described Plastc's repeated delays.

In July, the company announced another delay, blaming a typhoon that wreaked havoc with its parts suppliers in Asia. The release date was pushed into the fourth quarter of 2016.

When we reached out to Plastc, the firm said it was shipping orders "in late Q4 (Nov/Dec) of this year." But separately, CEO Ryan Marquis said on a Facebook video released in late September that only a small group of buyers would receive their cards this year, as part of a test group, and the rest wouldn't be shipped until next year. …

Plenty of Plastc consumers aren't convinced the product will ever arrive, and aren't shy about complaining. On Plastc's Facebook page, the firm is currently offering a T-shirt giveaway, leading another buyer to write, "Want my card not a damn T-Shirt."

Plastc did not answer additional questions about the consumers' frustration.

[Magnify Money]


A Redditor nicely summarized all of Plastc's broken promises from emails and Facebook posts:

Email on 7/9/15 = "August[2015] we'll be able to send you an email detailing the EXACT date that Plastc will ship."

Email and FB Post on 8/18/15 = "Plastc Card's ship date is April 29, 2016"

Email on 02/18/16 = "our new shipping timeline is August-September 2016"

Live Stream on 7/14/16 = "We are definitely going to be delayed past September"

Live Stream on 9/1/16 = "Shipping right now is slated for Q4"

Live Stream on 9/29/16 = "We're gonna be shipping the product in late Q4"

Live Stream on 12/6/16 = "…our initial projected ship date is going to be Q2 of 2017, which is in line with what I said in our last Q&A"

[Reddit]

April 2017: Plastc Announces It Is Shutting Down

On its website, Plastc announced, "After making enormous leaps in development, product innovation and progress towards our goal, Plastc has exhausted all of its options to raise the money it needs to continue."

Plastc, a smart payment card that can store all your CC details, promised to be the only plastic you'll ever need to bring when it started taking pre-orders in 2014. Now, almost three years and countless shipment delays later, the company threw in the towel. In a statement posted on its website, Plastc says it has officially shut down on April 20th and will file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. 

[Engadget]


The team writes that it's, 'disappointed and emotionally distraught, and while we know this is extremely disappointing for you, we want our backers to know that we did everything we could to make Plastc Card a reality."

The company explains that it thought it would close $3.5 million in funding in February this year, but that fell through. Another possible investment deal of $6.75 million fell through, too. What's not clear is how more than $9 million wasn't sufficient to get backers their orders. 

[The Verge]


Coin, the original smart card company, stopped producing its cards in May 2016. Stratos, another smart card company that launched in May 2015, shut down later that year. Currently, the only smart card company that is still solvent is Swyp, whose website states that its smart card is "going on sale soon." We'll see. 

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