littleBits closes Series A, announces unique partnership with PCH

July 2012

littleBits consists of tiny circuit-boards with simple, unique functions engineered to snap together with magnets. No soldering, no wiring, no programming, just snap and play. Each bit has a simple, unique function (light, sound, sensors, buttons, thresholds, pulse, motors, etc), and modules snap to make larger circuits. Just as LEGOs™ allow you to create complex structures with very little engineering knowledge, littleBits are small, simple, intuitive, blocks that make creating with sophisticated electronics a matter of snapping small magnets together.

 

LittleBits has just closed their Series A round of investment of $3.65 million, with True Ventures leading the round. Also among the investors are  Khosla Ventures, O’Reilly Alpha Tech, Lerer Ventures, Jeffrey Walker and recurring investors: Joi Ito, Joanne Wilson, and Salah Chamma.

The second piece of news is that we entered into a unique partnership with manufacturing and supply chain management leader PCH to produce littleBits as part of their Accelerator program. Only days after we launched our first products, they started flying off the shelves, and demand has been growing at an overwhelming pace. PCH creates consumer and medical electronics, accessories, and packaging for some of the most coveted brands in the world, and manages to combine mass scale with world-class quality. With their help we will be able to increase and improve our production capabilities and get kids and adults around the world to get creative with electronics.

Creating a new product is never easy, especially when we are striving to break new grounds in the fields of electronics, toys, education and open hardware. We are thrilled to be sharing our adventure with some incredible partners, who are not only some of the most well-respected investors in tech and open source hardware, but also share our vision of building a platform that inspires and propels the creativity of the world’s next many generations.

In September of 2011, we raised a seed round led by Joi Ito (that included Nicholas Negroponte, Taha Mikati, Fadi Ghandour, Josh Spear, Jason Port, Joanne Wilson and Salah Chamma). That seed round allowed us to get off the ground, and to put our hunch -that the world was hungry for a new pipe cleaner and popsicle stick- to the test.

Turns out, our hunch was right on. In 9 short months, we launched 30 products on the market, won Best of ToyFair, got a talk on TED.com with close to 500k views, made partnerships with CNET and WIRED, sold thousands of kits and bits, and built an amazing team (Paul, Jordi, Krystal, Udit, Jen, Mary, Sima, you rock!).

Now it’s time to fly off the ground, and to grow! So we are hiring! If you believe in our mission to make something that does something, get in touch.

Light it, push it, turn it, twist it, bend it, buzz it, blink it, shake it!

- ayah
littleGeek

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