Pebble raised over $10 million in its 2012 Kickstarter campaign for an e-paper smartwatch.
The campaign began with a goal of $100,000 and quickly became one of Kickstarter’s most prominent successes. By the end of the campaign, it had raised approximately $10.3 million from more than 68,000 backers. The watch connected to smartphones and used an e-paper display designed to conserve battery power.
Pebble’s crowdfunding success helped establish smartwatches as a major consumer-electronics category before Apple released the Apple Watch. The company shipped its first watches to backers in 2013 and later introduced additional models.
Pebble eventually faced intense competition from larger technology companies. Fitbit acquired Pebble’s assets in 2016, and Pebble’s services were later discontinued. The campaign remains a landmark example of crowdfunding-driven hardware development.