Back in November, ZTE announced that it would be crowd-sourcing a new phone, codenamed Project CSX. When the voting for the name was settled, the company announced that it would be called Hawkeye, and launched a Kickstarter at CES in January.
In the month and a half that followed, things haven't gone so well for Hawkeye and today, ZTE finally canceled the crowd-funding campaign.
The results aren't entirely surprising, as when the company first announced the project, we were expecting top-of-the-line specs, such as a Snapdragon 821 chipset, 4GB and 6GB RAM options, and 64GB and 128GB storage options.
What we ended up with was a $199 phone that had a Snapdragon 625 chipset, 3GB RAM, 32GB storage, and a 1080p display. Naturally, potential customers weren't impressed, and weren't willing to put up $199 to express their faith in the project.
ZTE has since apologized for its blunders, offering a poll where fans could vote on what should be changed when the firm relaunches the campaign. Right now, 47% of the 181 voters have chosen to replace the chipset with a Snapdragon 835, while 19% want stock Android, 7% want a larger battery, and 27% have chosen 'Other', leaving their desired feature in the comments.
In the end, the Kickstarter campaign reached just over 7% of its $500,000 goal, with a total of $36,245 pledged. With only 181 votes on the poll, it will be worth watching the next iteration of Project CSX to see if spec changes will make a difference at all.
Source: Kickstarter via The Verge
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