In a nutshell...
We make super comfortable keyboards that are beautiful and hackable.
Keyboardio in the news
This may be the most beautiful keyboard ever made—CNET
$299 buys you the ergonomic keyboard your wrists deserve—Engadget
"My wallet fears the day this butterfly hits crowdfunding"—Gizmodo
Keyboardio's Wooden Model 01 Mechanical Ergonomic Keyboard Kickstarter Soaring—Tom's Hardware
The Keyboardio Model 01 is the Prettiest Keyboard Ever—Tech Times
Model 01 Keyboard Conforms to Typists’ Needs—Slash Gear
Butterfly Keyboard Makes Typing a Customizable Breeze—PSFK
An Heirloom-Grade Keyboard—Geek Dad
Keyboardio's Model 01 is a Stylish Ergonomic Keyboard—Ubergizmo
The Model 01 Wooden Mechanical Keyboard: Built for a More Discerning Typist—Geeky Gadgets
Episode 23 w/ Roy Bahat & Dan Strickland—Product Hunt Radio
A connected grill, smart textiles and the perfect keyboard make up Highway1's latest startup class—Gigaom
A random walk down hardware alley—Tech Crunch
Scratch Building a Keyboard—BoingBoing
Keyboardio interview - OSCON 2014—O'Reilly
Keyboardio floats like a butterfly, stings with your thumbs—Tech Report
A Warm-Feeling Wooden Keyboard—Slashdot
Can hardware incubator Highway1 be the new Silicon Valley startup garage?—Cult of Mac
Highway1's second batch—TechCrunch
Keyboardio Aims To Make Keyboards Better—Airwalk Design
Making Your Own Keyboard—Rebuild
Why We Made It
We come from different backgrounds, but all of us have spent most of our work lives (and a good deal of our personal lives) in front of a computer. Keyboards are the fastest, most accurate way to get information into a computer. Still, most keyboards out there just aren't very good: they're uncomfortable, unattractive, and poorly made. We want to change that with Keyboardio.
The Model 01 is our first product, and like all our products, it will ship with "source code and a screwdriver". We believe hardware should be open - you should have access to the firmware so you can make it better. We also believe hardware should be beautiful and work well right out of the box. Basically it's the keyboard we always wanted, but had to build ourselves.
Founding Story
Jesse created the first prototype of what would become the Keyboardio Model 01 as a hobby project, because he wanted a better keyboard. Since then, we've been through dozens of prototypes, read hundreds of pages of ergonomics research, set one 3D printer on fire, and conducted long-term tests with some wonderful beta testers.
Kaia and Jesse co-founded Keyboardio to bring beautiful keyboards to the world. They met when Kaia saw a tiny Vaio laptop Jesse was using and she just needed to learn more - you might say working on consumer electronics together is destiny. Their strengths are complementary: Jesse has experience building amazing open technologies that help people work better; Kaia has experience in finance, operations, strategy, and marketing. And they've been married since 2007.
Keyboardio's first product, the Model 01, was developed while at Highway1, a hardware incubator based in San Francisco but with Shenzhen roots. We’re also supported by angel investments from people who’ve used their keyboards to change the world, including early engineers at Twitter and Nest, the founder of a dozen local newspapers, and the founder of Poetica.