October Update!
about 8 years ago – Tue, Oct 04, 2016 at 09:24:21 PM

Hi everyone,

Just a quick status update on progress. 

We received Uno boards last Friday; the boards were the very last components we were waiting for before shipping everything to our warehouse in Brooklyn, NY. Woo! 

Here's the latest from a call today with our manufacturer: 

Packaging the kits (lasting 10-14 days) is now in full force and they expect everything to get shipped by air (7-10 days) to our warehouse. Once in our warehouse, kits will get delivered to all backers ( approx. 5-7 days). We'll keep you in the loop as things roll out. 

We're banking on having tracking numbers once the shipment lands in NY. Our fulfillment partner, ShipBob, is helping us create them for you; everyone will receive notifications via email. So right now, we're looking at delivery during the fourth week this month. For international backers, some of you may receive shipment during the first week in November. We're almost there! 

Here are pictures of the process since we know a lot of you enjoy these: 

Lastly, we've also started beta testing the online learning platform which will be home to all instructions and video tutorials. We have about 25 backers who agreed to help us test it so far. If you're interested, let us know and we'll ship you a small solder badge kit with a link to the learning portion of the site.

We're doing this to get as much feedback as possible before launching the tutorials for the wifi-bot. Your feedback will help us improve the site and make last minute touches before adding other tutorials.

We're so excited to be delivering soon! Thank you again for your patience. As always, if you have any questions, please reach out to us anytime. ([email protected])

Thanks,

Oscar and Dave

September Update
about 8 years ago – Tue, Sep 13, 2016 at 07:37:48 PM

Hi everyone,

Oscar and Dave here from Thimble. Just checking in to keep everyone in the loop about our progress this month. 

Fulfillment and shipping:

We met with our fulfillment vendor a couple of weeks ago and took a tour of the warehouse. We wanted to make sure everything was up to standards and everything looks great.  In case you're wondering, we're using ShipBob as our shipping/handling partner; they'll receive, store, and ship all 2,000 kits. ShipBob is located in Brooklyn, NY so the transition from port to warehouse will be pretty smooth. Here are some pictures of the warehouse: 

Shipping:

A quarter of all kits (without the UNO board) will be ready to ship this week. However, we're holding off on shipping these until all kits (with UNO boards) are ready. We didn't think it'd be fair to have some of you with kits and some of you without. We're being transparent here and want to fill you in on the decisions we're making. Based on this, we're looking at end of September and beginning of October for sending kits out. Almost there!  Again, thank you for your patience thus far. 

Kit instructions and video tutorials:

Our open-source learning platform is complete and we're in the process of creating instructions and tutorials for all kits. A special shout-out to those of you that have agreed to test the learning portion of our site.  We'll be asking you to provide us with feedback to make the learning experience better and better. If you'd like to test out the learning platform, please shoot us a note and we'll be happy to add you to the list. ([email protected]) For those of you that have reached out, we'll be in touch very soon. 

Future kits: 

Development for future kits is underway; we're prototyping, testing, and manufacturing about 12 different projects that we'll deliver in the coming months. For those of you that are curious, here is a video of the piano synthesizer kit that you can expect to receive this fall if you signed up for a multi-month subscription. (kudos to Paul Lane, one of our engineering interns, for creating this project). It's fantastic for music lovers out there! :) 

In the mean time, we'll continue providing biweekly updates; I know many of you are waiting for these so as soon as we know the status of the shipment, we'll let you know right away. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach us. Either Dave or I will get back to you as soon as we can. 

Thanks everyone!

Best,

Oscar and David

August update!
over 8 years ago – Fri, Aug 12, 2016 at 08:49:25 PM

Hello fellow backers,

We hope you’re enjoying the summer. As always, we’ve been heads down focusing on delivering our first batch of Thimble kits. This update will provide progress on the following items:

• Wrapping up Backerkit surveys 
• Production 
• Shipping date 
• Learning platform + tutorials 
• A sneak peek at future kits

Let’s get right to it.

Wrapping up Backerkit Surveys:

95% of our backers have answered their surveys. Thank you for filling these out. We still have 97 of you that have to finalize your surveys. These will allow you to enter your address into our system so we can ship out your kit. Without the survey, we don’t have a way to send one to you. We plan to close all surveys by September 1st. If you haven’t filled one out, here’s a link where you can find your survey by providing your email address. https://1pwc38w.backerkit.com/

Production:

We’re 90% through production. The one thing that’s delaying us at the moment is the production time for the arduino-compatible Uno boards which have a 30-45 day manufacturing lead time. Beyond this, we’re good to go and kits will get shipped by air to our fulfillment partner in Brooklyn and from there, they’ll get shipped to all of our backers.

Everything we have accomplished in the last six months is to ensure we have all the systems in place to deliver kits consistently. Please keep in mind we were only planning on selling 300 units back in February. In reality, we ended up selling closer to 2,000 units. Having all the systems in place entails having a reliable manufacturer, production/testing schedule, a fulfillment/shipping partner, and high-quality tutorials that get launched with each monthly kit. So although we said we’d ship between April and June - we really needed the extra time to take care of all of this.

Shipping date:

Based on the most recent status from our manufacturer, our delivery date is estimated to be between September 20th - October 15th. We know it’s frustrating that we keep pushing this back but we’re waiting on the Uno boards to come in which are the last pieces to go in the boxes. We’re pushing the manufacturer on this so we’re hoping that the boards come in sooner rather than later. 

If this changes, we'll let you know right away. We can't tell you how much we appreciate your patience on this part of the process. This is the most painful part for us because we want these kits out already and put them in your hands. 

We’ve also finalized the design for the boxes; a big thank you to those of you that helped us choose a pattern. 

Learning platform:

As you know, the kits are just one piece of the experience that we’re offering. We’re also creating video tutorials so you can build each project with step-by-step instructions. If any of you are interested in testing the learning platform before we officially launch it next month, please shoot us a note at [email protected]. We'd be happy to get your feedback and find ways to improve it over time. We plan to put a lot of time and energy into the instructions so that anyone can learn how to build the projects regardless of their background in electronics. Here is a screenshot of the learning platform at the moment.

A peek at future kits:

We’ve also been busy creating the future projects that we've promised as part of our subscription. Some of you ordered a three, six, or twelve month subscription so a lot of those projects are already underway. The good news is that these designs have been submitted to our manufacturer in advance so we don't have any more delays. We're also fine-tuning the production schedule to estimate better manufacturing lead times. Here is a look at what we’ve prototyped, tested, and submitted to our manufacturer: 

We hope you're looking forward to these projects. We have about 30 additional projects that we're working on. If you have ideas for particular projects you'd like to see come to life, please email us and talk to us about what you're thinking. We'll try and make it happen.  

Lastly, we’re definitely listening and we’ll be sending out updates every two weeks. We apologize for not sending one last month but we’ll be more vocal about everything - even if it’s a delay. In the mean time, if you have any questions, please ask them here in the update section or shoot us a note at [email protected].

Thanks everyone! Again, we really appreciate your patience, your comments, your feedback, and most of all, your support. At this very moment, we're breathing nothing but Thimble.io. 

Best,

Oscar, Dave, and the Thimble Team

PCBs, Delivery Schedule, Questionnaire, and Backerkit Surveys!
over 8 years ago – Tue, Jun 07, 2016 at 12:38:22 AM

Hi Backers,

Hope you're well. Here's a list of updates you'll find in this note. 

• Updated design for the printed circuit boards (PCBs)
• Delivery schedule for the first kit
• Questionnaire (enter to win a free six-month subscription)
• Bay Area Maker Faire
• Our summer team
• Backerkit surveys

Updated PCBs:

 In April, we submitted the updated designs for the PCBs. Since then, we’ve received samples of the PCBs from our manufacturer; these will come in your very first kits. With the updated designs, you’ll be able to add the speed encoders and ultrasonic sensors to your wifi-bots that we promised during Kickstarter stretch goals. The PCBs look awesome and you can check them out below. Next steps entail receiving actual sample kits from our manufacturer which will arrive to our offices within the next 7 days. Once we give our manufacturer the green light on these samples, they’ll produce and kit 2,500 units for delivery this summer.

Delivery date:

We’re projecting a delivery date between July 25th - August 15th depending on your geographic location. We’re shipping to 20 countries so shipping may take up to two weeks for some of you. We’ll have a few more status updates before delivery and keep you in the loop about any tracking information so you know your kit’s whereabouts. As always, we appreciate your patience. 

Questionnaire:

We’ve created a short questionnaire to learn more about our Kickstarter backers. If you wouldn’t mind spending 3-5 minutes filling it out, we’d really appreciate it. It's 15 questions and they're mostly multiple choice. Participants will be entered into a raffle to win a free 6-month subscription. Winner can keep the subscription for themselves or donate it to a friend or loved one. Here is the link to start filling it out: https://thimble1.typeform.com/to/NNRdhx

Maker Faire:

Thanks to Microchip and Atmel, David and I were fortunate enough to attend Bay Area Maker Faire where we met about 20 of our fellow Kickstarter backers. It meant the world to us that you came over to say hi and introduce yourselves. These events are important to us because it’s how we understand what you’re expecting from us and learn what we can do to make improvements.

Interns:

David and I have learned that we can’t do it all on our own. We brought on a few engineering and marketing interns last week to assist us with product and business development this summer. A special shout out to all of them for their hard work thus far.

Backerkit Surveys:

You've been great about filling out your backerkit surveys. Out of the 1,777 pledges, 1,605 of you have completed them.  Without these, we cannot ship you a kit since we need your address. If you haven't received a backerkit survey yet, here is a link to the form where you can retrieve it. https://1pwc38w.backerkit.com/. Remember to use the email address you used to sign up on Kickstarter.

Okay all! Back to hustling. If you have any questions or concerns, please reach us at [email protected]. 

Thank you for your patience, encouragement, and support! 

Best,

Oscar, Dave, and the Thimble Team! 

Backerkit surveys, manufacturing, and shipping
over 8 years ago – Mon, Apr 11, 2016 at 05:31:21 PM

Hi everyone,