Reviewing their comms, they talked about an issue with the initial design back in March 2019, in a trio of releases, until mid-April when they announced they finally understood the issue, and promised a solution in a week or two, stating “it will have quite a significant impact on the product”. On May 3rd, they dropped the completed bomb - the details of why the initial product was never to work, and a detailed view into the new product. This release was titled, appropriately, “Redesigning the iQsquare Power Meter”.
This said, anyone who bought in a product that could be used with any pedal (Speedplay users, anyone?) got a major shift under their feet, so to speak. And those were not happy campers.
I’d also note that the average Kickstarter-funded startup would have either folded and run with the remainder of the cash register content, or just shipped the not-really-functional original products, once it was found not to really work back in March.