Thief makes off with two Razer prototypes from CES booth

Razer put on a pretty good show at CES 2017, announcing two new products that captured a lot of attention, but things turned sour for the company by the time the show wrapped up. According to Razer CEO Min-Liang Tan, someone stole two prototypes from the company's booth at CES. Tan didn't say which prototypes were stolen, but considering the two big announcements Razer made at CES, it isn't hard to imagine what the thief was after.

The thief most likely had their eye on Project Ariana and Project Valerie. Project Ariana is a new work-in-progress projector that adds peripheral visuals to regular gameplay, while Project Valerie is gaming laptop that features a whopping three 17.3-inch displays. It's safe to say that Project Valerie was one of the stars of CES, potentially making Razer's booth an attractive target for some of the show's more unsavory attendees.

In a statement posted to Facebook, Tan said that his company is working with law enforcement and CES organizers to find the crook. "At Razer, we play hard and we play fair," he said. "Our teams worked months on end to conceptualize and develop these units and we pride ourselves in pushing the envelope to deliver the latest and greatest."

NOW READ: Razer Project Valerie Hands-OnOf course, it may not have been a simple show attendee who made off with the prototype. In the Facebook post, Tan mentions the possibility of industrial espionage. "We treat theft/larceny, and if relevant to this case, industrial espionage, very seriously – it is cheating, and cheating doesn't sit well with us. Penalties for such crimes are grievous and anyone who would do this clearly isn't very smart," he said.

Assuming the stolen prototypes were Ariana and Valerie, Tan hits the nail on his head with his final point. The Ariana projector that Razer had on hand wasn't a finished product, so whoever made off with that is going to be disappointed to discover that they've stolen what amounts to a regular projector. That's a lot of risk for something that, in the end, isn't as special as its tech demo would suggest.

In any case, Tan turned to his followers on Facebook to help find the thief. He's asking anyone who was at CES 2017 and may have some information about the theft to drop an email to legal@razerzone.com, promising that all tips will be kept confidential. Hopefully Razer is able to track down the thief and its prototypes, but with attendance at CES climbing very close to 200,000 people, that might be a difficult task.

SOURCE: Min-Liang Tan