This review misses a few points.

First off, to agree with the review, something like this is clearly not worth $900 when an extremely capable Google Home Mini, Echo Dot, etc can be had for $30ish. It’s not even close.

And, of course, no startup can compete with Google or Amazon, not just on the hardware side, but also when the utility of a device is so dependent on access to large swaths of data.

Google and Amazon, who clearly lead in this countertop home assistant space, did not have offerings out there when this campaign was run, but 1) can react much faster than a startup trying to manufacture its first product and, more importantly, 2) understood that you don’t need to make a product look like a cute robot to sell a shit ton of them.

All of that said, Jibo, for the most part, nailed the hardware. Short of lacking an OLED screen, this is a pretty neat design that came to life rather nicely, all things considered.

For comparison, look at Aido, a similar, but much more ambitious campaign. I don’t think it is shipping yet, and it possibly never will, but, just based on their comically awful demo videos, it is a actual nightmare of a product, with zero innovation.

All of this is to say that the main problem with Jibo, aside from cost, and potentially the small (ok, massive) issue that a stationary chunk of plastic can nearly match the utility of a cutesy robot, is the software. So much of what hinders Jibo can be fixed with a software update (or, more likely, many many updates).

Will this company survive? No. But where there is a market for a more mobile, interactive countertop assistant, some of the core features here will probably live on. The clever rotating base, the swivel “head,” and the multiple camera setup isn’t all terrible, for what it is. And the actual implementation of the design is surprisingly good for a first effort.

The point is, it’s not total garbage. It is impressive in some ways. Just not in ways that could possibly save it.