It’s been a long and rewarding journey so far for AHEAD, both with many ups and many downs, but not without excitement, long hours of hard work and dedication.
It all started on a skiing trip in 2014. Marco, our to be founded had his light bulb moment, which gave him the concept and idea for AHEAD. Finding it difficult staying in touch with friends, through the thick layers of clothing and protective gear while carving up the slopes, Marco saw a gap in the market, where this simple, yet powerful device can change the way people move and stay connected, not only on the slopes, but any activity involving protective gear.
In 2015, AHEAD was awarded a spot in Samsung’s Coveted C-Lab Acceleration Program. This gave the team the boost and financial freedom needed to boost our R&D efforts in hardware manufacturing.
Samsung gave us the legs we needed to start walking, with their seed funding, and AHEAD may have never existed as it is today without it. Now, we are a fully independent company, with ownership rights to all of our IP and our staff members now work for Analogue Plus.
In April, we we’re able to produce the first prototype for AHEAD, and field-tested it in the most scooter populated country in the world, Vietnam.
After constant improvements, taking apart the idea and putting it back together, we we’re able to produce our second prototype. The second prototype sported a slimmer and sleeker design.
2017 is the year we introduce AHEAD to you guys! We started heavily marketing our product, through social media, press releases, trade shows and any other way we could think of to share our excitement for AHEAD.
In May, we we’re able to launch our first crowd funding campaign on KickStarter, providing the first opportunity for you guys to invest and support our dream! We had a great response and feedback!
This allowed us to start mass production in July, with the first batch due in October.