When UC Berkeley alum Antoine Balaresque returned from a family trip to Yosemite, he realized that his mother was missing from all the photos. The reason? She was always ‘behind’ the camera. This is what led Balaresque and Henry Bradlow to an idea of a flying camera that would follow you around and capture high-def photos and videos. This idea was named ‘Lily,’ and it was year 2013.
Cut to 2015, the Lily camera was announced. The idea of Lily flying drone quickly gained massive attention from the media and end-users. Lily Robotics, the company which started in the basement of a Berkeley robotics lab, was able to generate a huge pre-sale revenue of $34 million from around 60,000 pre-orders. Impressive!
Now back to 2017, the Lily camera project is dead. A startup sitting on millions of dollars with an impressive idea couldn’t deliver its promise. In fact, the project has been assumed dead since late 2015 when the company stopped responding to customers. They kept delaying the shipping and never delivered a single Lily camera till date.
On January 12, 2017, the company sent an email to its customers that the company couldn’t produce the camera and were going out of business. A blog entry by the founders stated they would issue full refunds to their customers in the next 60 days. On the same day, a lawsuit was filed against Lily Robotics by the District Attorney of San Francisco. The lawsuit claimed that the startup ‘intentionally deceived customers,’ and that the viral promotional video wasn’t even shot on an actual Lily camera.
Now as Recode reports, Lily Robotics sent a short email to its customers about how they can get their money back. To claim Lily camera drone refund, pre-order customers have to fill a form on Prime Clerk’s website. Prime Clerk is helping Lily Robotics with its bankruptcy claims.
According to the form, there’s no time frame when the payments will be processed. Although the company is sure that they will refund all the money, it is not clear exactly when.
We do not have a time frame for payments at the present time. Lily Robotics will provide additional information regarding customer deposits through this website as it becomes available.
According to the case details on Prime Clerk’s website, the refund procedure has not yet been approved by the Bankruptcy Court and it may change in future. The case details also suggest that a hearing has been scheduled on April 25, 2017 at 3:00 P.M. (ET).
This all leads us to believe that the startup is not sure about when and how to process the refunds. With no clear information about when the pre-orders will be refunded, it looks like refunds are currently stuck. It could take forever before customers actually receive their Lily camera drone refund.
How to Claim Your Lily Camera Drone Refund?
To claim your refund, you will need to fill out a form and provide information like your name, email, and address.
After submitting the form, you will be redirected to the case information page. There will be no confirmation after you submit the form.
Now that you have submitted your refund claim, all you can do is to wait – just like you have been waiting since forever. If you got lucky, you will receive your refund soon.
Did you pre-order Lily camera? How much did you pay for it? Did you receive your refund? Do share your experience.
