xCraft is giving your phone an update that probably would have taken until iOS 100 to be released – their premier product, the PhoneDrone, turns your cell phone into a drone.
Co-founders Charles Manning and JD Claridge expect autonomous, winged cell phones to hit the sky as early as September 2016, a goal they’ll be well on their way to achieving after a recent appearance on Shark Tank. All five sharks decided to back the project, investing $300,000 each for a combined 25 per cent share. PhoneDrone’s Kickstarter campaign, meanwhile, was fully funded within an hour and has raised over $150,000 so far with 35 days to go.
“Since their inception, smartphones have been confined to only two dimensions – limited to roam the earth at ground level,” reads the company’s elevator pitch. “It’s time to set your smartphone free! Grant your smartphone access to the third dimension with PhoneDrone Ethos!”
Powerful stuff, and yet it’s no more complex than a Kinder egg toy.
Operating the device requires no previous drone experience, it comes with a simple and intuitive app for iOS, Android, and even Apple Watch, and can be charged from a USB port or with batteries for extended flight time (20-25 minutes). You don’t even need a second device to turn your phone into a drone, you can simply give it instructions in the app with GPS coordinates and it’ll follow you around.
The PhoneDrone comes with a $275 USD price tag, or you can order 10 for $1650 USD. Having a drone handy for unparalleled #iphoneonly Instagram photos makes sense, but having a fleet of 10 seems a little excessive…and will probably have you closely monitored by the NSA.
Anyway, check out the video below, we’re going back to working on our holiday wish list…
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