It's not rocket science—nor is it the first acoustic iPhone speaker we've seen, though it might just be the smallest—just dedication to the craft, a decent work ethic and commitment to quality: we're pleased to report that the upstarts at Kinetic Custom Machine has reached its funding goal for its first Kickstarter project, "Sonastand," as of last Thursday afternoon. Like many All-American entrepreneurial stories we're hearing these days, it's a timely tale of a couple young fellas, Colin Chu and Bob Wimbrow, with a dream and a CNC machine.
Colin found a worthy counterpart in Bob when they were juniors in high school whose hobbies included building model rocket cars and modding paintball guns—"thinking back on it, we played with fire quite frequently—with vague dreams of making stuff for a living. They went their separate ways after high school (I'm picturing something like the last scene of Superbad): Bob completed his B.S. in Physics at UC Riverside, Bob ended up on the East Coast, working in the solar industry, while Colin put his International Studies degree to use as an English teacher in Japan, where "he became increasingly fascinated by the fact that every person I observed working was doing it to the best of their abilities."
Their disparate paths led them back to California, where they finally had the means to fulfill their longtime dream of owning a CNC machine. To hear Bob tell it, I can't help but think that a bench-top lathe might have put me on a completely different path myself:
My first exposure to metalworking was in high school working for Blume Engineering where I worked with a (Prazi D6000) bench-top lathe. I was blown away by the process of metal cutting, the forces involved, and the accuracy/beauty of the result. I've had a thing for these machines and what they can do ever since. Being a computer guy from a very young age, the idea of combining the accuracy of these machines with computer numeric control (CNC) blew my mind. What a potent combination!
The "Sonastand" is not only their first Kickstarter project but the "first product from [their] long list of ideas," and it will be available through the de facto venue for DIY product design these days for another month or so. Colin notes that they could have used Don Lehman's advice regarding shipping when they launched their project, adding his own take on the Crowdfunding Revolution, the topic du jour:
One thing that I enjoy is cutting out investors and middlemen. For sure there is a lot of benefit to investors, but at least in our case, we don't want to have to report back to our investors and update them on how much profit we are making. I've told potential investors that "it's our company, our ideas, our products, and we would like to keep it that way", and Kickstarter helps with that. I feel like the hardest thing to do as a new company is to raise capital and Kickstarter allows that to be possible. The market decides what is worthy.
Our two cents, more CNC porn and the full story (from Colin) after the jump:
