You can check the thread for Pipes, there are some reports there, from a little while back.
This seems to me a good example of some of what can go wrong with a crowdfunded electronic hardware development, massively delayed schedule, poor feedback, and a final product below expectations, though not a total train wreck either.
Interesting to weigh this with the successes, and the products that never would have existed, when considering a decision to back any project.
…the basic concept remains a great one…
while the neverending projects and those with even bad or dead endings seem to take place a little little more often than thoss solid ones with happy endings…
i personally never joined a pre paid cake…but only because, i’m not aware that much of projects that really trigger me too hard…
if one’s crossing my way, i tend to think…yup, great idea…good luck with it…
It would be good for us to look back at the products listed in this thread and put some metrics to this question.
Unlike you reeloy, I’ve backed quite a few, four in fact. I’m super pleased with three of the four, and the fourth one, the Osmose, has not been completed.
I got an enormous discount on the Osmose, and they’re only holding a smallish deposit, and they’ve way exceeded the initial concept,. Even with the big delay, i feel that that was a no-brainer good deal.
( We shall see ! )
The other three, one was on time even with a very short schedule, one was a couple months late, and much better than expected, and the third, four months late, though the communication was good and it’s now in everyday use.
So i’d back more, but i’m still quite cautious.
Total car crash.
I remember, they just axed you ! Kerplunk. Off with your head.
Because of what happened to you RiK, i looked up the Kickstarter policy agreement, after you told us what happened. ( That’s over in the Pipes thread for anyone who’d like to read it. )
Kickstarter seems pretty loose in this regard with their terms. I wonder what the Indiegogo policy is like ? Everyone should check the agreement document.
EDITED: Changed a couple words for clarity, and added link.
Funded a rhyrhmo 2 years ago. Everyone in America got theirs way back and apparently the UK ones have been sitting in customs for months. Shit show
Damn that sucks!
What’s a rhyrhmo ?
Annoyingly you can buy it even though nobody in Europe has their one they paid for on kickstarter
Something to do with the shipping company
I followed up on the list i put together the end of January:
Synths
Controller Only
Utility
Thanks for this list! Abstrakt Instruments VS-1 is still delayed too. Seems like it’s just a matter of time but their decision to move to a real-time operating system for handling control data seems to have had a big impact on their plans, along with the usual component and shipping delays from board manufacturers, etc 
The target delivery date Abstrakt put on all of this complicated multipart development when they listed this project in January 2020, was July 2020. One might assume from that, that this project was completely finished through all development engineering phases including firmware ready for final assembly, and had accounted for the delay in funds clearing Kickstarter. Clearly not the case.
Yes Covid happened in the meantime, but this project had no chance of hitting the target date as set regardless.
Which points out a much larger flaw in the way Kickstarter projects are sold in general. There is little incentive for companies to show reasonable development schedules upfront. Schedules for projects of this complexity bracket a range of time, with best case, worst case estimates. Hard to sell a project to a corporation, let alone investment partners when you present worst case estimates.
I think this accounts for a lot of the long delays in so many projects. It’s not really delay though, it’s that the initial schedule is being used to “sell” the project.
Good to be aware of this distortion when evaluating backing electronic development projects.
Many project schedules on Kickstarter are very realistic and doable, and those projects often complete on or ahead of schedule. But stay aware how frequently project schedules are made overly optimistic to sell a project.
Yeah I agree - and I always go into Kickstarter expecting the worst 
!
For this one, I don’t know if they saw the likely delay in components/ boards due to China’s COVID situation early last year and decided on the OS rewrite given the extra time, or if it was always planned, or an impulse decision …
One thing people were frustrated about was in their pitch they budgeted some money towards having a project manager to overcome some of the communication issues people had with them in the past. That seemed to be ditched very quickly once things got going, leading to predictably erratic updates 
…
At least Abstrakt are known to be this way and deliver eventually, so I’m confident it will show up. I have the DIY kit, so at least that will go out the door before the assembled ones, which were a much higher investment from folks. Feel bad for them particularly.
All excellent points !
You bring something else up that applies to all electronic development projects, and to people investing in them.
When you plan a project with a schedule, you have to do your best to anticipate what the market will be, not what it is. The market window is always moving, and a delay may just close your opportunity. That’s a very common story.
The same issues apply to you as an investor or backer. You are not buying a product now, but in the future. And then there are two factors in play. Not only does the market change, but so does your needs as a buyer.
Now predicting the future is … well, risky. Hard to anticipate what a Behringer or a Sequential or a Black Corporation is going to do in the future. But that said it’s not unreasonable to foresee competition arriving for this particular product. This is a product that was well defined a long time ago.
In a similar category to this is the Superlative SB01, which also has been a long time in coming. That product also goes into a crowded well defined market niche. But Superlative did at least engineer in some unique enhancements. But their time to market is killing them, and their backers too.
AN ASIDE: If i was building the kit, the complete version of this product might just arrive before i was done. 
Have they talked about things causing delays much? I always imagine when something has a built in battery it ends up being much more work than people initially expect. Especially once you realize you need to ship the thing internationally. Obviously covid has slowed many things down.
Two things that were preorder style and not kickstarter, M8 which looks to be quite close to shipping and Space Case TE-2 which seems to be plugging along but is years behind the initial release schedule, but also seems like a really crazy project to take on.
Was the isla 2400 Kickstarter style ?
I mostly bring it into this conversation as it was a little late ,but the machines shipped seem to be delivering on their promise. Overall I’d say it was a success ( I don’t own one , this is just my observation)
Of course had I ordered one I’d probably be moaning that it still hasn’t arrived yet but the shipping / delivery definitely seems Covid / ship delays .
The TE-2 thread on Mod Wiggler is a bit of an adventure, and after all the excitement, tempers now seem to be fraying. Here’s a post from earlier this week:
This was billed as “order the product” like 4 years ago, but even then the details were beyond shaky, and at this point is several levels worse than an intentional, regimented crowd funding campaign. In fact traditional crowdfunding sites would have banned this producer for blowing through delivery dates, poor comms, selling other tangential products when the original item isn’t even properly prototyped, etc. There is no ETA, and there isn’t even like a checklist or roadmap to getting the orders fulfilled… unless that’s “only on the buyer’s email” (which maybe it is, I don’t know). I know he posted some clips of “a device” making sounds, but there is still not even a fully functioning prototype, right? And you guys are talking about it shipping in a couple months lol.
https://modwiggler.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=3595256#p3595256
Having said that some of the instagram posts of it in action are quite exciting https://www.instagram.com/p/COJYjklhXg8/
Meanwhile, the Dirtywave M8 is shipping at ~100 units per week (after some minor and announced delays) and everyone’s loving it:
There is a three oscillator analog hybrid mono synth in 60 hp Eurorack project now up for funding until December 14th. The Artisan Nucleus.
This looks to be in the good category, with the engineering largely done, the funding for scaling up production, where development gets expensive. Also left to do is some sound design, which is legitimately done later. This company has sold hardware on a small scale before, and some of this new design pulls from previously done hardware.
The KS version of this is $770 USD, which is legitimately expensive, for what this is. I expect the likelihood of them hitting their target ship date in Spring of 2022 as good.
Another positive side to this, if they get funded, is that the core of this mono product will be used someday to make at least two polyphonic product — a 4 voice desktop unit, and a 6 to 8 voice keyboard unit.
ADDED : The Nucleus did not get funded.