'Shark Tank' judges were offered $96 billion in profit by a man with a bizarre pitch — it went as expected

Over its long run, "Shark Tank" has seen some of the craziest pitches. However, very few come close to the proposition made by a scientist who claimed he could create gold from seawater. Biomedical engineer and inventor Mark Sullivan pitched the idea of his electric generator that created gold as a by-product. Asking for $1 million in exchange for 10% of equity in his company, Sullivan promised that he would make the Sharks $96 billion in profits. While it sounded exciting, no one was interested in making a deal. 

A hurricane-style generator that would surely (not) work

The Texas inventor pitched a generator named after him on the third season of Shark Tank. After strutting confidently to the middle, Sullivan through a diagram and a model of the generator, explained to the sharks how his invention works. He claimed that the Sullivan Generator works by leveraging the earth's spin to produce electricity using seawater.

He said that the generator pulls up salt water from the sea and through the Coriolis effect, the water is spun in a chamber like a hurricane, leaving behind minerals and delivering vapor to a vortex chamber.  While this vapor worked the turbines to generate electricity, the other precipitates/byproducts would be minerals like manganese and gold. Sullivan boldly claimed that the generator would make $9 worth of gold with every cycle.

The Sharks were naturally in disbelief. The questions started flying in as everyone wondered how the machine would work. Eventually, one by one all of the sharks opted out of investing in Sullivan's idea and he walked out of the show without a deal. However, the proposal has gone down in TV history as one of the most memorable ones on the show. 

Where is Mark Sullivan now and does his machine work?

Sullivan's invention has been reviewed by many experts who have determined that the generator is flawed and would not work.

In a detailed YouTube video, Physics Odyssey breaks down the concept and claims of Sullivan. The creator explains that all three aspects of Sullivan's generator would not work and it may be a complete failure.

Despite this, Sullivan maintains that his invention is functioning and has published papers on it on his official website. On his website, he claims that the "revolutionary generator" is the first in history to use the constant rotation of the Earth and it will help the world achieve a truly sustainable source of energy. 

One of the other memorable pitches was from the owners of Haven Lock, Alex Bertelli, and Clay Banks, who pitched an impenetrable smart lock. The duo claimed that doors with ordinary locks were too easy to kick down.

Unlike Sullivan, they didn't just make the claim and went on to demonstrate this. One of the founders of the company tried to kick down a door on the stage to show how vulnerable they were. However, even after several attempts, he fails to make his claim stick. Due to the poor pitch, they got no offers, but it went down as one of the best pitches of the show.

This article originally appeared 2 months ago.