ecoATM announced today that it has raised $14.4 million in funding to expand its automated self-serve kiosk system that buys back used electronics directly from consumers for cash or store credit.
The funding from Coinstar, Claremont Creek Ventures and Silicon Valley Bank will help ecoATM manufacture and deploy at least 100 machines this year, up to 1,000 more by 2012 and then thousands beyond that, according to Mark Bowles, ecoATM co-founder and chief marketing officer. Executives from Claremont Creek and Coinstar's Redbox haved joined the ecoATM board of directors to help oversee the expansion.
EcoATM's "smart business model" inspired Claremont Creek's investment, said Randy Hawks, managing director of Claremont Creek Ventures and ecoATM's new board member.
"ecoATM provides tons of value to the consumer by giving them cash for their digital clunkers and simultaneously managing the recycling in a very earth-friendly way," he said
According to the Consumer Electronics Association, U.S. consumers collectively buy about 500 million new electronic gadgets each year, and upgrade cycles are short as manufacturers tempt consumers with new features. The average U.S. household now owns 26 different consumer electronic devices for a total of nearly 3 billion devices. The majority of these devices are still in good working condition when consumers upgrade.
"Unfortunately, few practical options exist for consumers to responsibly resell or recycle these devices, so the vast majority of them still enter our landfills as toxic e-waste, the fastest growing segment of our national waste stream," Bowles said.
ecoATM trial locations have already collected tens of thousands of devices over the past year and paid out hundreds of thousands of dollars in return for recycling. That success has led the company to its first patent from the United States Patent and Trademark Office and a Phase 1 grant from the National Science Foundation. Both will help the company broaden the spectrum of devices the system handles, said Bowles, who was the principal investigator on the NSF project.
"This is a win-win-win for us, the consumer and the environment," he said.
To be successful, ecoATM machines must recognize thousands of different models of phones and other devices and then assess any cosmetic or internal damage, said ecoATM Chairman and CEO, Tom Tullie.
“This requires us to continually push the boundaries on a unique combination of artificial intelligence and non-traditional machine vision technology," he said. "We are very happy that the USPTO has awarded these efforts with our first important patent and are extremely grateful to the NSF for their support as we refine and expand this technology. “
Click here for a list of eco-ATM locations.
