Romanian entrepreneurs crowdfund USD 440,000 for robot-shaped bluetooth speaker

Sound Hero, a Bluetooth speaker in the shape of a humanoid robot, has raised USD 445,000 on the crowdfunding platform Indiegogo. The speaker was designed by a team of Romanians and the project is to enter the production phase within the next four to five months. It takes the form of the Ad’om character, developed by Kalium Labs, and retails for USD 150. It is available in two sizes: of 45 cm and 3 kg, and of 72 cm and 5.5 kg. Ad’om comes with a 10 watt treble speaker in his hero sized chest and is positioned on a dock with an active 20 watt subwoofer with full range spectrum sound. It also works as an ambient light source that allows listening to music with custom colors as it features 16 million variations with a multicolor RGB LED dock for an interactive pulsating visual map of the music, which can be customized via the K Heroes app. At the same time, it can also be used as a Wi-Fi range extender and can wirelessly charge smartphones or wireless devices. It is made of ABS plastic to maintain low weight, enhanced with premium matte and metallic paints, available in seven colors. The idea for the speaker came as the founders of the project were working on developing a virtual assistant for a Dubai mall, Andrei Ursachi, the coordinator of the project, told startupcafe.ro. It later became a Bluetooth speaker. The speakers will be manufactured at a plant in China, with an initial output of 5,000 items. In order to deliver towards resellers, the project's initiators hope to attract financing up to USD 1 million from an investment fund. The demand from resellers is of around 20,000 units, Ursachi explained. The speakers sell worldwide, but the main markets are the United States, Singapore, Australia, United Kingdom, Germany, India, and United Arab Emirates. Romanian team rolls out crowdfunding campaign for kids’ learning assistant editor@romania-insider.com