Infinium blows through $63mln, Phantom still vaporware

by Christopher Grant { Feb 23rd 2006 at 9:00PM }

Gamespot reports that a prospectus filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission revealed that Infinium Labs, makers of vaporware-of-the-year runner-up Phantom Game Console, have blown through nearly $63 million dollars, with only $3.5 million going to development costs. Half has been spent on advertising (advertising what?) and the other significant expense was... consultants. Why are we not surprised?

In order to recoup their losses, the company reiterated their intention to (further) delay their Phantom Game Service and concentrate on selling the lapboard peripheral. They are also having trouble paying their $25K/month Seattle rent, so if any readers in the Seattle area have an extra bedroom, or a converted garage, give 'em a call.

See also:
CEO of Infinium Labs jumps ship, rows off into the sunset
Phantom in 2006? Infinium Labs insists they're relevant

[Thanks, jc]

Tags: Infinium Labs, InfiniumLabs, Phantom

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

TxdoHawk @ Feb 23rd 2006 9:12PM

The only thing I find suprising is that Infinium can still find investors, when it's obvious the money is going towards hookers and cocaine.

andrew @ Feb 23rd 2006 9:12PM

I feel sorry for them.

jaemz (jc) @ Feb 23rd 2006 9:16PM

I sent this tip in 2 days ago, anyways...

Infinium Labs (loved the penny-arcade satire ) has really blown it, not just for themselves but for other companies that might have wanted to enter the market.

While it can be argued weither or not there is room for 3 consoles, not alone, four... I personally think there was room for more competition. Consoles aside, I think this will likely make it harder for new game developers to get funding as well. We might lose some great new game potentials because investors are too scared to take risks in video games.

Where was Infinium Labs' business plan from the start?

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/01/30

Jago @ Feb 23rd 2006 9:34PM

This isn't all that surprising actually...

If any of you saw/read the whole thing on HardOCP.com about how they looked into the background of the CEO of Infinum, you would know that the guy has done this NUMEROUS times. He starts a company, goes on spending sprees and buys expensive things and then bankrupts the company.

Omega697 @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:08PM

Here's the important question.

Which would you rather have: -$63 million and vaporware or -$4 billion and an XBox?

Justin @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:16PM

Holy Freaking God, 63 MILLION dollars? Just think what we could've gotten if that money was in the hands of people that could actually put it to good use! Hell, give it to Valve, have them put Steam in the Xbox 360 strictly for the purposes of game distribution (a plug-in to Live, not a replacement) so while you're playing Project Gotham you could be downloading Ghost Recon in the background. Bam, you have the Infinium console.

Or hell, give it to any number of startups that have good ideas - even if they never some to fruition, at least they had a shot!

baR_n1 @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:28PM

So i guess no one's familiar with the mechanics of money laundering? Bleed dirty money through your shell corporation (infinium), collect "clean" money from bogus contract work (the advertising). Why is this surprising? Gizmondo was the same scam...

LaughingTarget @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:33PM

Microsoft spent $4 billion to get their name in the console market, and it worked.

Infinium Labs spent $63 million on pizza parties.

What I find entertaining about all of this is that there were still some holdouts from the DotCom bust that were willing to "invest" in a company that had no business plan to speak of. I guess they felt left out when they didn't lose their shirts.

Here's hoping they can at least convince around 4 million people to buy the lapboard to cover the costs.

Rare Hare @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:41PM

the thing is (i've said this before, and i'm sure i'll repeat myself yet), the Phantom is not technically a console. hell, it's not a console at all. infinium labs doesn't even try to pretend it is.

all the Phantom is supposed to be is a means of downloading [current-gen] games and sampling/buying them. like a big, online, easy-to-use, hard drive.

sound lame? you're right. interested? nope. still think it's funny that the thing will never see daylight? you bet.

do you suppose there's a REASON they decided to name this thing the "PHANTOM"?!

Alex K. @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:43PM

anyone who's ever taken economics knows that if you spend $5 million to develop a product, and you still need to spend $1 million to bring it to market, but you know the product will only earn $3 million, you have to launch the product to lose the least money (these numbers are just examples)

not to say phantom is like that. the phantom is doomed, they should have given up a long time ago. although i heard that E3 when they showed it, it really was a great product.

but even if they can get it out the door, it has no games. it'd be like the ngage only worse.

Josh @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:45PM

Interstingly, I work for one of the consultants they paid, an investor relations firm called CEOcast. And yes, they paid us a shitload of money. I didn't see any of it but they definitely knew how to pour money down the drain.

Alex K. @ Feb 23rd 2006 10:45PM

And if they had spent this $63 million on launching a console instead of consulting and advertising, they'd have a solid 4th console.

their terrible mismanagement is their own fault.

MrPolarBare @ Feb 23rd 2006 11:25PM

It's too bad they couldn't pull it all together sooner. I never saw a hope for this machine, but now that I've enjoyed the download service with X360 so much, I've realized that maybe this system could have had a niche place in the market if released a year or so ago. But now it is too late. XBLA is too similar of a service and has way too big of a head start. And with Sony and Nintendo coming around the corner with download services as well (well we hope), there isn't really a chance for this system.

Honestly sometimes I wonder what these companies are thinking. The first Nokia N-Gage. The Gizmondo. Man, are these people idiots? How do these people even get into these positions where they can blow all of this money? I don't know if they are complete retards, or complete geniuses since they can convince investors to give them millions of dollars.

#7 - "they spent $63 million on pizza parties"... thats funny. I rarely laugh on here, but that was a good one.

MrPolarBare @ Feb 23rd 2006 11:32PM

#1 - "They spent the money on hookers and cocaine"

That is the most ridiculous comment ever. Obviously if you spend the money on cocaine, the hookers will join in for free. Never spend money on both...thats a waste of money. CEO rule #1, buddy. Instead you can buy a Ferrari with the money you saved on the hookers and run it into a telephone pole. Duh!

Aaron @ Feb 23rd 2006 11:39PM

Posts #1/#14 are great...

Anyways, you think anyone working at 'Phantom' ever checks these forums out? I wonder how many people still work at this place? What the heck would they do for eight hours a day??? (Play NDS and PS2 and talk crap like 'we can do this...')

epobirs @ Feb 24th 2006 12:02AM

A complete audit would make fascinating reading. I'm sure there is already a business journalist out there trying to round up material for a book.

Jago @ Feb 24th 2006 12:23AM

"although i heard that E3 when they showed it, it really was a great product."

Great? That's to strong of a word.
Interesting? Yea.

I have to admit that the design of the unit is actually pretty slick and the lapboard setup was acutally pretty neat. The only problem with the setup is that PC hardware changes so fast that the hardware will age REAL fast.

joe @ Feb 24th 2006 2:30AM

Wow this is great. Im in the moving profession in the Seattle area and nothing makes me happier than seeing a future customer on my favorite website hahahaha!!

Chris @ Feb 24th 2006 10:22AM

Amusing for us, but if I was an investor I would be super-pissed to know that a company I had given money to burned through 65 million dollars and spent less than 4 million on actual development of the product. I'd say that there's no question now that Infinium is officially doomed to the annals of vaporware history.

Jellodyne @ Feb 24th 2006 10:58AM

That's too bad they didn't deliver anything. Just think -- a game could launch on the Phantom and Gizmodo, and then Ewe Boll could make a movie about it! We could have had this whole fake gaming ecosystem the eastern german mafia could launder their money through, and they wouldn't even need to tie it into any real platform.

don_sf @ Feb 24th 2006 11:40AM

why are they even trying? they are not rich so they will fail what ever happens.

microsoft lost 4 billion with their biiiiiiig blak buiiilding (xbox 180), and clearly the only reason they are here with 360 is because it never hurt them.

look at xbox 180's position, contending with best selling consoler ever, ps1, and the ps2 which had a huge user base and nintendo gamecube.

soon, nintendo will have something out as well has ps3. didnt someone tell them that these three gaming giants are gonna cause a tiny lil problem?

go home phantom, its soooooo rubish.

don_sf @ Feb 24th 2006 11:45AM

by the way thes are the specs:

AMD� Athlon� XP 2500+ central processing unit (CPU)
NVIDIA� GeForce� FX 5700 Ultra graphics processing unit (GPU)
NVIDIA nForce�2 Ultra 400 platform processor
256 MB RAM
40 GB local content cache
Microsoft Windows XP� Embedded Operating System
Dynamic, personalized user interfaces customizable for age, gender or technical expertise
Lapboard, mouse and game pad included

my second view is, you most probably will be able to download a pirate and play it easily on your home pc. and why would you play games on that when youl have ps3, 360 and rev.

wel i wont have 360, but alot of people will.