The ZANO Drone: The Selfie Drone That Couldn't Fly, Built by People Who Couldn't Drone
How a Welsh company with zero drone experience raised £2.3 million and delivered approximately nothing
In November 2014, a company called Torquing Group launched a Kickstarter for ZANO, which it called "the world's most sophisticated nano drone." It would be palm-sized. It would follow you automatically. It would take aerial selfies. It would connect to your phone. It would be, in the words of its slickly produced campaign video, the future of personal photography.
The campaign raised £2.3 million from over 12,000 backers — twenty times its original goal. It was the most-funded European Kickstarter project in history at the time.
There was one issue, and it was significant: the people building ZANO had never built a drone before. Not a prototype. Not a hobby drone. Not a paper airplane with aspirations. The founder, Ivan Reedman, had a background in IT, not aeronautics. The team was based in Pembrokeshire, Wales, which, while scenic, is not historically known as a hub for cutting-edge autonomous aircraft development.
ZANO shipped approximately 600 units to backers. Most couldn't fly. Some couldn't even hover. Many arrived damaged. The company entered administration in November 2015, almost exactly one year after the campaign launched. Kickstarter commissioned an independent investigation — the first in the platform's history — because the failure was so total and so visible that even Kickstarter couldn't pretend it was normal.
The investigation found that the money had been spent on luxury offices, company BMWs, and salaries for a team that was, by most accounts, making it up as they went along.
The Vision: A Drone in Every Selfie Stick's Nightmare
The ZANO pitch video was gorgeous. A tiny drone, small enough to sit on your palm, launching from your hand and hovering at a perfect selfie distance. It would follow you on hikes. It would capture your skateboard tricks. It would film your dog running on the beach. The footage was stabilized, the colors were vivid, and the drone responded to gestures with the obedient precision of a well-trained border collie.
None of this was real. The demo units in the video were heavily modified prototypes that bore approximately zero resemblance to what backers would receive. This is the drone equivalent of a restaurant putting a stock photo on the menu and then serving you a napkin with ketchup on it.
The specifications promised a 5-megapixel camera, GPS tracking, follow-me mode, obstacle avoidance, and 10-15 minutes of flight time. For £170. In 2014. This should have immediately triggered the same skepticism you'd feel if someone offered you a Ferrari for the price of a bicycle, but twelve thousand people saw the video and decided to believe in the dream.
The Glorious User Experience
Neil from London, UK — ★☆☆☆☆
"My ZANO arrived four months late in a box that looked like it had been kicked across the Welsh countryside. I took it outside, launched it from my hand as instructed, and it immediately flew sideways into a hedge at full speed like a confused bumblebee with a death wish. I retrieved it from the hedge, tried again, and it ascended six feet, rotated in a circle three times, and dropped onto my driveway with the graceful descent of a brick. The camera captured a beautiful photo of my lawn at an extremely high velocity. One star."
Katja from Berlin, Germany — ★☆☆☆☆
"I never received my ZANO. I did receive seventeen email updates explaining that everything was going brilliantly and production was on schedule. The eighteenth email explained that the company was bankrupt. The emotional whiplash between update seventeen and update eighteen was cinematic. I want my £170 back, but more importantly, I want the six months of optimistic anticipation back."
Patrick from Dublin, Ireland — ★☆☆☆☆
"I was one of the roughly 600 people who actually received a unit. I wish I hadn't. The drone weighed more than advertised, the battery lasted about four minutes instead of fifteen, and the 'follow me' mode interpreted 'follow me' as 'flee in the opposite direction.' The app crashed every time I tried to connect via Bluetooth. I now own the world's least functional paperweight. It cost me £170 and it can't even hold down paper because it's too light. It fails at being a drone AND a paperweight."
“It would be, in the words of its slickly produced campaign video, the future of personal photography”
Click to TweetStuart from Cardiff, Wales — ★☆☆☆☆
"I live twenty minutes from where this company was based. I drove past their offices once and saw multiple BMWs in the car park. At the time I thought, 'Business must be going well.' In retrospect, business was going well for the employees. Not so much for the twelve thousand people who'd funded those BMWs. I could have driven twenty minutes and thrown my £170 directly into the Bristol Channel. The Channel, at least, would not have sent me optimistic email updates."
The Truth: When Kickstarter Investigates You, You've Really Failed
ZANO's collapse was so spectacular that Kickstarter took the unprecedented step of commissioning journalist Mark Harris to write an independent investigation. The resulting report, published in collaboration with Medium, is a masterpiece of restraint — the journalistic equivalent of describing a house fire as "a thermal event."
The investigation revealed a company that was, from the beginning, profoundly out of its depth. Torquing Group had no drone engineering expertise. The hardware was perpetually unfinished. Software was buggy. The manufacturing process in China was chaotic. When early test units failed, the team responded not by solving the engineering problems but by redesigning the casing to look better, which is like responding to your car's engine failure by repainting it.
The £2.3 million went quickly. Luxury office space. Company vehicles. Salaries for a growing team. Marketing at trade shows. By the time manufacturing started, the budget was already strained. The drones that were eventually produced were rushed, untested, and shipped in the full knowledge that they didn't work properly.
Of the 12,000+ backers, approximately 600 received a drone. Of those 600, the vast majority received a drone that didn't function as advertised. The company entered administration in November 2015, one year after raising the money. The administrator noted that there were essentially no assets left to distribute to creditors.
The ZANO investigation prompted Kickstarter to implement stricter policies around hardware projects, including requiring working prototypes before campaigns could launch. It was the kind of policy change that makes you wonder why it wasn't a requirement in the first place, in the same way that "wash your hands" signs in restaurant bathrooms make you uncomfortable about the period before the signs existed.
The Verdict
The ZANO drone is what happens when enthusiasm outpaces competence by approximately twelve thousand backers and £2.3 million. It's a cautionary tale about the gap between a beautiful concept video and a functioning product, and about the specific danger of giving millions of dollars to people who are learning on the job with your money.
The drone market has since been conquered by DJI, which builds drones that actually fly, follow you accurately, avoid obstacles, and take photos that aren't blurry images of hedges captured at terminal velocity. The DJI Mini 4 Pro does everything ZANO promised for roughly the same price, but with the minor advantage of being a real product that actually exists.
We rate it 1 out of 5 functioning rotors.
If you want a drone that actually flies — a seemingly low bar that ZANO failed to clear — see our alternatives below.
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✅ What to Buy Instead
ZANO and arrives within a week. | View on Amazon |
✅What to Buy Instead
DJI Mini 4 Pro
Under 249g, 4K HDR video, 34-minute flight time, obstacle avoidance — the gold standard of consumer drones. It flies. This is not optional for a drone.
DJI Air 3
Dual-camera system with 46-minute flight time and omnidirectional obstacle sensing. For when you want a drone that avoids hedges instead of flying into them.
What to Buy Instead
Tried-and-tested alternatives that actually deliver on their promises. We may earn a small commission on purchases.
DJI Mini 4 Pro Drone
Under 249g, 4K HDR video, 34-minute flight time, obstacle avoidance. The gold standard of consumer drones. It flies.
DJI Air 3 Drone
Dual-camera system with 46-minute flight time and omnidirectional obstacle sensing. Avoids hedges instead of flying into them.
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