Instabeat—Crossing the Finish Line

Lebanese entrepreneur Hind Hobeika was just 21 years old when she launched her startup, Instabeat, which had developed the first real-time bio-feedback device for swimmers to monitor and improve their performance. It had been an extremely testing 10-year journey to bring the Instabeat product to market due to numerous manufacturing challenges that had caused Hobeika to almost shut down the business in 2016. However, with help from the co-founder of Jawbone, Hobeika raised additional capital and restarted Instabeat, moving its headquarters from Lebanon to San Francisco. Hobeika used the new funding to move quickly ¾ expanding her team, finding a new manufacturing partner, and re-starting conversations with the Michael Phelps Organization. However, her COO believed she should take the opposite approach – slow down and focus on getting a shippable product.
In 2017 her manufacturing struggles resurfaced and Hobeika found herself once again seeking a new manufacturer. After an extensive search, she selected a manufacturer based in China, but found it difficult to manage the process from San Francisco. Ultimately Hobeika decided she needed to move to China to keep the manufacturing on track. What started out as a plan to be in China for one or two months, turned into nine months. Hobeika weathered many personal challenges of living in China, but was determined to bring the product across the finish line. By May 2019 Hobeika had returned to San Francisco with a finished product and was preparing for launch when a new, well-funded competitor introduced its own “smart” swimming goggles. Hobeika needed to decide how to proceed.