Because it's not that special that those deals fall through. I don't know about Dragons Den, but afaik Shark Tank US as well as the german version "Die Höhle der Löwen" had seasons with 60% of the "deals made on air" not happening.
It normally worked well for the start-up though as they used to get a lot of publicity/sales directly from appearing on the show and had found investment through other means.
This bit of advice has served me quite well over the years. At a celebration party for a new investment in a company I'd previously co-founded but was only a stockholder at the time, the CFO excitedly told me that I was 'worth millions', and asked 'how did it feel?'. I told him that "I'll tell you when we get an exit" and changed nothing about my life. Good thing, because while the check had cleared on that investment, the exit several years later wound up with the stock amount value down in the five figures.
One guy I know had co-founded a company, was doing OK. I noticed some impressive new equipment that showed up on his website and we chatted about doing some projects together and how he's got a major deal coming in and had invested well into six figures. The next thing I knew, his company had vanished and he was working for a small shop several states over. They didn't get the project after all, and were immediately bankrupt.
Worse yet, was a story from an attny friend I'd worked with; he told me about a guy (client?) he knew who 'got' a VC investment, divorced his wife, bought a big new house, car, etc. .... and the deal fell through.... not sure what happened to that guy, but I'm sure it wasn't pretty.
Repeat: "The deal is not done until the check clears"...
[edit: typos, clarity]
Probably not. I just assumed it was BBC news giving a bit of publicity to a BBC programme by regurgitating a public tweet.
It wasn't exactly top draw investigative journalism though looks like the journo did at least spark up the My Lupo website and add a couple of stock BBC photos. So that's nice.
I found it rather surprising as I've bought similar bluetooth key fobs, from Aliexpress for around $1.40 each and they mentioned they where planning on selling them for around £20.
My conclusion too. It would have been useful if the story actually provided any information but it seems the 'journalist' was either asked to, or decided to see if he could stretch a tweet out to a full page article.
The dragons really are some of the worst people.
One that is very successful (4.5 million sold) is https://thetrackr.com. I have no affiliation--I just hear their ads over and over on lots of podcasts. They sell them for about $30 each, so they are similarly more expensive than AliExpress type ones.
I wouldn't need one myself but trust me, there are folks out there who would really benefit from it.
Also the fact that you can buy something nearly identical for $1.40 pretty quickly rules out paying several hundred dollars for it.
I'm not surprised that he pulled out. Just wish my dad did the same.
Sarah Willingham pointed out quite early on how useless it was "the instructions say 'make sure the phone is not muted'? What use is this if I've lost it?". Google's existing solution beats this, being able to bypass audio restrictions. I assume Apple has similar capabilities?
Yes there's still the other half... using your phone to find your keys... but pfft.
Aside... Sarah's contribution reminded me of how technology savvy the dragons are. There was a great moment in a previous series where Hilary Devey teased out of an applicant that they didn't own the source code for their own website. I've often slipped into thinking of them as "business people" but she very clearly understood software and licensing.
Kind of tough lesson to learn, especially if you've had to parade yourself on a TV program.
Sounds like a weird way to put it. Aren't these programs pretty much cheap national advertising for the participants, even to those who don't get a deal?
What I meant was that I can imagine preparing and appearing on a TV program would be incredibly distracting (getting normal VC investment is bad enough).
[I'd also never take any of theses TV show deals for a software company as they seem pretty bad to me. For something you sell on home shopping networks etc. it seems better because you get the distribution expertise. I have doubts you get anything besides the money and probably lots of hassle for software.]
