Factorli, Ambitious Las Vegas Small-Run Factory, Closes

Just 3 months after raising $10 million dollars from Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh’s VegasTechFund, Factorli, a small-run factory project, has been abruptly closed, and CEO Jen McCabe fired.

The announcement was posted on the Factorli site yesterday:

As of last week, Jen McCabe is no longer CEO of Factorli. As a part of this change she will no longer manage hardware investments for VegasTechFund. Jen’s vision for removing complexity from the hardware development industry was ambitious and we look forward to seeing her achieve great things in the future.

This is a challenging time for the Factorli team, but after an analysis of the company’s progress and future capital needs, it has been determined that it would be best to reallocate those resources to other Downtown investments. In consideration of the best interest of the team, the shareholders, and all parties involved, the difficult decision was made to cease operations and development of Factorli as of August 11, 2014.

The closing will be a disappointment to many hardware entrepreneurs who were hoping that the ambitious factory would provide an economical way to manufacture products in numbers that are not big enough to justify working with Chinese manufacturers.

The Las Vegas factory planned to open in January, 2015.

The team did not respond to a request from Make: for a comment.

Vendors and potential customers who have business-related questions were advised to email questions@factorli.com for help.