I guess the fact of such services existing and competing drives forward and funds genetics research, so from that point of view I'm glad they exist, but it seems like a strange way to spend so much money.
I know people who have grieved for months after losing their cat and their dog. Their connection was much more than "just a pet", it became family and as important as a child, sibling or parent.
Cloning is of course not guarantee the pet will be exactly as the original, but if there's a chance it will have similar personality I can very much understand the willingness to pay for it.
Grief is hard, but going back is impossible.
If the new cat behaves differently (which it will), you’re forced into one of two painful positions:
“This isn’t really them.” “Why aren’t you like you used to be?”
That comparison can prevent the new animal from being accepted as its own being.
I love cats and dogs dearly, so I don't say this lightly, but please just get a new cat (even the same breed!) and save the money for a worthier cause.
Given how popular (and expensive) it is for horses, it likely delivers on the results people are looking for. Note that current cloning techniques don't clone the mitochondria, which represents 1%-2% of the genome.
Seriously, though, why are you asking? Was there some breakthrough in biology recently that made it feasible and available?
Or are we actually talking about cat(1)?
It also only has a ~30% success rate, so it might be in the ballpark of $200K to get a living clone
But in all seriousness I’m interested in knowing the answer to this too, just out of sheer curiosity.
Wasted money.