In 2020, I made it my mission to design, patent and manufacture an innovative laptop shade to solve that universal problem: that laptops SUCK outside! Doing so would enable freelancers, digital nomads, students, photographers, creatives, professionals, DJs, pensioners, travelers (and not to mention, myself) to be able to work efficiently no matter where they are.
Working alone indoors for too long can zap your mood, motivation and productivity.
Allowing workers to switch-up their surroundings, working outside, in coffee shops, in co-working spaces, while traveling etc boosts employee satisfaction, happiness, and output!
Sunlight diminishes your screen visibility and overheats your device, shutting it down & killing long-term battery life.
Privacy and security are crucial to most businesses.
But laptops, ironically, expose your projects to the world!
SunShader is the original laptop ☀️ sun shade 🔥 heat shield and 👀 privacy screen that lets you, and your team, work from anywhere.
I set about developing the design, which began as a clunky cardboard box cut-out. The main challenge was designing the interface to attach the shade to the laptop. Elastic, magnets, hooks or clips were the main options.
After Hundreds of iterations and thousands of 3D printed clips later, the product has evolved into a sleek ergonomic folding shade with nylon flexible rubberized clips, air-flow channels, heat-deflecting materials and easy port access.
After a sell-out trade-show in Vegas, I added a new revenue stream: custom-branded SunShaders for B2B Enterprise clients. We even became a Halo Preferred Supplier and were recognized in the Top 10 Best of Show vendors in the PPAI Magazine. Following this success, I streamlined the concept with an interactive 3D design tool on our website to easily allow anyone to upload their own logos and order personalized SunShaders with ease.
I managed to deliver all 880 Indiegogo orders to customers in U.S, Canada, UK, Europe and Australia by September 2021, and then set my attention to selling as many units as I possibly could. I formed SunShader, Inc. and raised a Seed round from friends and family. I partnered with Capital Factory in Austin, TX to join their venture portfolio of companies. In return they provided me office space, and access to PR events and 200 mentors.
My mission was to sell 10,000 units, and 3 years later thanks to partnerships with Staples, Sharper Image, Amazon and Walmart, I have more than tripled that figure proving that the product solves a universal problem.
The future is bright ☀️ The future is SunShader.
