SEC Shutters Kodak-Branded Bitcoin Mining Rig ‘KashMiner’
Kodak has also licensed its branding to be used on bitcoin mining rigs.
The developer behind the purported and much-publicized Kodak-branded bitcoin mining equipment has officially halted operations and has denied ties to Kodak.
As CCN.com reported, KashMiner, a bitcoin mining equipment, was showcased at CES 2018 back in January by the company Spotlite USA, which claimed to be a licensee of the Kodak brand.
Spotlite stated that they were offering two-year leases on their machine which will cost $3,400 to rent. Customers were assured that the miner would bring in a monthly revenue of $375 worth of bitcoins, or $9,000 over the course of two years. They told that they would also take a cut of half of the generated bitcoin. The company stated that 80 of these devices were already in operation with plans to increase the operations multifold.
Halston Mikail, the chief executive of the whole operation, stated that they have plans to install these devices at the Kodak headquarters located in Rochester, New York to take advantage of the cheap on-site electricity.
Industry experts were quick to criticize the scheme stating that the monthly returns were misleading and that customers would struggle to break even on their investment. It then came to light that the machine was simply a Bitmain produced Antminer S9 machine with Kodak branding.
The website of the advertised miner has been since taken down. However, as evident from the archive, the website was incomplete and consisted of standard “Lorem ipsum” filler text throughout.
Kodak has since denied any connection with Spotlite USA and KashMiner stating that they have not officially licensed their brand to them. They also denied the existence of these miners at their headquarters.
In a statement to the BBC, Halston Mikail has stated that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) had prevented their operation from going any further. He said that they would instead install their mining equipment in Iceland, where users can rent them privately to mine cryptocurrencies.
As evident from the series of events, the scheme was either an ill-conceived business idea or a malicious attempt to scam customers. Irrespective, Kodak’s stock price was tripled after one week past the initial announcement of this scheme back in January.
The company Kodak has entered the blockchain space with their announcement of their blockchain platform KodakOne and KodakCoin back in January. The platform aims to enable photographers to register and license their work more efficiently by leveraging blockchain technology. The ICO, open to accredited investors only, for KodakCoin was supposed to be conducted back in January and has been delayed since.
Featured image from CES2018 via YouTube.
