Hi FlippyDrive backers,

We’ve gotten a large number of questions asking about tariffs, deliveries, and potential price changes due to the trade war. It’s hard to overstate the severity of the surprise 145% tax on our Chinese sub-assemblies and pending tariffs on the EU & Canada that would affect parts made there too. Because we are committed to shipping units without passing on the higher price to existing pre-orders, our primary focus has been to defensively contain our costs as much as possible amidst the regulatory uncertainty.

To save enough to pay through the tariffs or move production entirely offshore should they persist, in the near term, we’ve had to eliminate nearly all of our assembly, programming, and packaging hired help. Instead, we’re back to doing most of the work between the two of us, 7 days a week. That puts us slightly behind schedule, although only by a matter of days.

As of today, April 30th, we have shipped 76.5% of the total April units to Crowd Supply for distribution, and we are in the kitting/packaging process for the remaining April units. Please give Crowd Supply time to receive, process, and parcel out those units for your individual orders.

Here’s a summary of which units have been sent to Crowd Supply and which ones remain within this production batch:

We know this has been a difficult wait for everyone, and the geopolitical situation exploded at exactly the wrong moment after most of the units were in production with components purchased, but we have the funds to see through the current tariff load. The two of us are working every day to steadily churn out FlippyDrives, and we are in a good position to steadily continue production under the current regime or rapidly scale up production again should the tariffs recede.

Thank you for your continued support and patience!