Extra: Tortoise's Big Pivot and a Crowdfunding Guide
Tortoise ditches last-mile delivery for mobile commerce and should you pick a rewards or equity crowdfunding campaign?
OK. Ugh. OK. I’m really sorry to send out two emails in as many days this week. I posted a couple stories after the newsletter went out yesterday that I think you will get a lot of value out of. I didn’t want you to have to wait a week, so I’m sending out this brief extra edition.
Tortoise Pivots from Last Mile Delivery to Mobile Commerce
Tortoise announced today that it is ditching its last-mile delivery ambitions in favor of becoming a robo-mobile commerce company.
Typically when a startup pivots, it means something is going really well, or horribly wrong. In the case of Tortoise, the move into mobile commerce seems like a very smart play.
Instead of lugging groceries (slowly) to a lot of different houses, Tortoise robots will now roam around selling goods. Doing so just meant adding a Square reader to its robot (which makes buying stuff super easy), everything else stays the same.
Tortoise is offering the robots for free, and just taking a cut of sales. The company is launching with 18 retail partners and honestly, the sky’s the limit in terms of adoption and use cases.
I spoke with Tortoise CEO Dmitry Shevelenko this week and he gave me a lot of insight into his company’s pivot. I break down all the details you need to know back at the site.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F1a434204-5ad5-4f92-8614-aff219c5af24_4471x3357.jpeg)
A Quick Guide on Reward-based Crowdfunding vs. Equity Crowdfunding
Crowdfunding is a popular mechanism for food automation startups, but should your startup do a reward-based crowdfunding campaign like the kind you see on Kickstarter and Indiegogo — or an equity campaign like the ones from Wavemaker Labs, Blendid, Zippin, etc.?
Thankfully, OttOmate has a quick primer that can help you decide. It’s by Andrea Baldereschi, an expert specializing in crowdfunding who has collectively raised over $4.5 million and delivered thousands of products worldwide.
If you’re looking to launch a campaign, or are just curious about crowdfunding, you should definitely give this guide a read.
That’s it for this week! For real this time! Thank you for your patience and for reading!
-Chris