Vicis will maintain a Seattle presence, two years after the helmet maker went through a major and sudden downfall in 2019. Vicis is now owned by Certor Sports, a company that operates multiple sporting goods brands formed last year by New York City-based Innovatus Capital Partners. Innovatus last year purchased the assets of Vicis out of receivership for less than $3 million and formed a new company. It helped bring back a small group of early Vicis engineers and marketers who work out of Seattle. Related: What happened to Vicis: Inside the collapse of the high-tech helmet maker, as board decides… Read More
High-tech football helmet maker Vicis is a runaway leader in a new ranking of the key piece of equipment by the National Football League and the NFL Players Association. Vicis helmets took the top three spots in the annual Helmet Laboratory Testing Performance Results in which helmets are assessed by independent experts, measuring the ability of the equipment to reduce the severity of impacts to the head. The study, in its sixth year, featured more than 25 different helmets approved for use in the upcoming NFL season, and aims to help players make more informed decisions about which gear they… Read More
Vicis is back. The one-time Seattle startup darling that went through a major and sudden downfall in 2019 just debuted a new-and-improved version of its high-tech football helmet called the ZERO2. The launch marks a milestone in what’s been a roller coaster for Vicis over the past few years. After spinning out of the University of Washington in 2014, Vicis garnered attention for its unique ZERO1 helmet that featured specialized layers built to mitigate the impact of bone-crushing hits that cause concussions and put the health of professional football players in jeopardy. It raised more than $85 million over five… Read More
It’s been a couple weeks since the demise of Seattle-based Vicis, the high-tech football helmet maker that laid off all of its employees and was placed into receivership by its board just before Christmas. But the once highly regarded startup is still in the game — at least when it comes to being featured in NFL commercials that are airing during current playoff games. The Vicis ZERO1 helmet, the company’s signature product, shows up right at the start of an ad titled “Building a Better Game,” below, in which the NFL touts its commitment to helping engineers and innovators come… Read More
Raising money and managing investors can be a major undertaking for any startup, but for failed Seattle startup Vicis, the complexity was on a whole other level. The high-tech football helmet maker lists an extraordinary 389 investors on its capitalization table, or “cap table” as it’s commonly known in the business world. The list, never before made public, spans nearly eight pages in King County Superior Court documents unearthed by GeekWire. Vicis was placed into receivership last week by its board after running out of cash. The list includes current and former sports legends such as Aaron Rodgers and Doug… Read More
