Startup Frontback closes after attracting $ 4 million and 2 million users

Startback Frontback began with an idea: why not make an application that will simultaneously take photos from the main camera and the front camera of a smartphone? You can show what is happening in front of you and share your reaction. One idea is not enough, and, despite attracting two million users in two years of work, Frontback is closed.

From August to October 2013, the application attracted three hundred thousand users. Among them - Ashton Kutcher , Jack Dorsey and the Prime Minister of Belgium . The application received a lot of positive feedback .

Twitter offered to buy the service in 2013. The founder of Frontback said that he wanted organic growth, so he did not agree to the proposal of the social network. Now users do not understand how Frontback differs from other services, so they do not use the product often enough. Investors and the company's team felt that Frontback was unable to reach enough users to become a sustainable social network.

Frontback attracted $ 3.9 million investment in two rounds - 0.9 million in 2012 and 3 million in 2013. Investors include Alexis Ohanian (co-founder of Reddit and partner of the venture fund Y Combinator), Charlie Cheever (developer of Facebook and co-founder of the social network Quora ), Harry Tan (co-founder of Posterous, bought by Twitter), Kharj Taggar (he sold Auctomatic to 22 years) , partner at Y Combinator), Michael Arrington (founder and co-author of TechCrunch blog), venture funds Fuel Capital , Index Ventures , Lerer Hippeau Ventures , Susa Ventures .
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Frontback will end application support on August 15, 2015. Users will have time until September 15 to export data. After that, all photos and captions will be erased from the company's servers. Until September 15, iOS users will be able to photograph from two cameras, but the application will turn off the possibility of social interactions. The Android version will be removed from the Play Store.

The startup will be closed, but the idea will live - the founder of Frontback is sure. For example, Samsung suggests using two cameras simultaneously on the Galaxy S5 smartphone.