³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ

Read how Darren got on and let us know what you think using the comments below

Darren presents a polished pitch for his Control Wand which is currently being trialled by five police forces in the UK.

He ends the pitch by offering the two Dragons the wands but Shaf Rasul finds the threads worn and suggests it is badly manufactured.

Much to his surprise Darren agrees, saying they are pre-production models for display only.

Shaf says the product is essentially a torch and suggests, jokingly, he might refocus his marketing energies and aim at a Star Wars constituency.

In answer to Julie Meyer's question as to who his target market is, Darren suggests it would primarily be used by police officers at checkpoints.

Julie replies this seems very limited and niche.

Shaf wants to know how he came up with the product and Darren replies it emerged from an A-level Design and Technology project 10 years ago.

Julie then asks how comfortable Darren would feel about running a business and he says his long term ambition is to be self-employed.

The American Dragon then asks him about his trading forecast in 12 months time.

The County Down entrepreneur replies that he hopes to be selling 370,000 units by then, generating a £120,000 net profit.

While Shaf expresses incredulity, Julie wants to know how he can support such huge figures.

Darren admits the projections are dependent on one of the five police forces currently trialling his product signing up for it.

Shaf then asks what patent protection he has and is shocked to discover that Darren has none at all - he does have a registered design patent in the UK but that is all.

Julie points out that there are always things outside an entrepreneur's control but not to be able patent the product is a huge difficulty. She is also concerned that he has failed to demonstrate to her sufficient market demand.

She feels that Darren does not have a scalable business and while he has given a good account of himself he hasn't pitched an investable opportunity. For those reasons she is out.

Shaf agrees that Darren is clearly very driven and that had he come to the Den with a different product he may have invested. For the Scot, Darren isn't thinking "big enough" and for those reasons he is out.

The deal done in the Den:

No investment