The invention of Ukrainians began to sell in Apple stores

The next generation of LED flashes iblazr guys collected the necessary 70 thousand dollars in just three days. Photo: kickstarter.com

Startup Concepter was the first and so far the only Ukrainian project, whose product - the first outbreak of iBlazr - appeared on the shelves of Apple official stores.

iBlazr is a portable flash designed for shooting with smartphones, tablets, digital or SLR cameras. Additionally, it can be used for illumination during a video call or as a small but powerful flashlight.

The second version of the iBlazr 2 flash, which was also raised on Kickstarter, also recently began being sold in European Apple Stores. The device is now available on shelves in 108 Apple brand stores - in the UK, Italy, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Sweden, Belgium and Turkey.

According to startup business development director Evgeny Rogov, the main difficulty in negotiations with Apple is the speed of response to their demands. “This is a company that has the right to dictate terms, requirements and deadlines. Knowing the statistics and the response to the first generation of iblazr, Apple immediately became interested in iblazr 2, ”he says. Apple wanted to see and “touch” the product, the start-up was given a timeline that in the interests of the Concepter had to be respected.

Since the startup had the opportunity to put its product in Apple stores for the Christmas holidays, it was necessary to hurry. At that time, the team had only a few iBlazr 2 samples that needed to be finalized, and the final version was to be sent to Apple.

With the samples quite a bit late for the deadline, but it so happened that the startup received the first order for iBlazr 2 even before Apple saw the samples. “We don’t imagine how this could happen in a company with a whole set of rules, standards and procedures, but it seems to us that it’s because we won trust with the first generation,” says Rogov.

The initial contract with Apple was preceded by long negotiations. The start-up was guided in this by companies that have at least one product from the Apple Store in their portfolio - that is, they directly cooperate with Apple and have access to most stores and retail chains. Oleg Malenkov, COO Concepter, managed to negotiate with two such companies in the United States and Britain - now they are key partners for a startup.

The process of negotiations with Apple was not easy: for example, for the first generation, the packaging had to be redesigned according to the company's requirements, for which it was necessary to produce a separate batch of goods - despite the fact that the order had not yet been confirmed.

Previously, Forum wrote that the Codesmart company, created by Ukrainian developers in San Francisco, Launched Inby application. This is an aggregator of discounts, promotions and applications that sorts and updates them using a special neural network and maps them. The application is already available in Google Play and the App Store.