CES 2008 : A Week to Remember

We went to Las Vegas last week with high hopes and modest expectations.  We had some good momentum coming from the CBNC coverage (The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch - thanks guys!) that had aired the prior week, and were in the NY Times as well.  While we had scheduled numerous blogger/press briefings, our basic goal was to have some great conversations and generate a little more buzz and exposure.   What actually happened was something else entirely.   

In a nutshell, we hit a nerve at the show, fired up the imaginations of a good number of people and ended up winning CNET's Best of CES award for Emerging Technologies. Just re-reading that sentence gives me the shivers.  "We won what??" It's a little surreal.  I had always pictured that as something reserved for huge companies.  On top of that, we had a lot of coverage, from individual bloggers to large outlets, well exceeding our expectations. For a glimpse of the coverage we received click here.

When I started Bug Labs it was based on a vision where everyone had the opportunity and ability to easily build whatever gadget they could imagine.  I felt that if Home Depot could turn us all into home improvement gurus we could do the same for technology.   I expected that message to resonate with a core group of technologists and early adopters.  What I wasn't expecting was the more mainstream response we received at CES.  I was (and still am) a bit flabbergasted.  The possibility that my original vision might not be quite as geeky as I thought is disorienting - but awesome!

So why did this all happen?  I don't have a precise answer, but our superb marketing team (Jeremy Toeman and Mehrshad Mansouri) laid the foundation by making sure we were well prepared and busy talking to influential bloggers, press and others.   Our product itself was ready to go with some great applications and demos thanks to our crack hardware/software development and QA folks.  But those two things weren't what tipped the scales in our favor.   To be honest I don't know what did.  The best word I can think of to describe the result is combustion.  I think people were just ready to hear what we had to say and were excited to spread the word.  We came out of that event more excited than ever and a bit surer of our mission.  At the end of the day, people like stories (and products) that put them in the driver's seat and that's what BUG is all about.

I want to sincerely thank everyone who came by our booth and took the time to speak with us.  We value your thoughts and feedback, took a ton of notes and will hopefully count you among our customers in a few weeks when we start shipping.  I very much look forward to keeping you all informed as we head towards that moment.  Please do not refrain from jumping into the conversation.  We want to hear what you have to say!