Pebble Lays Off 25% of Its Staff, Smartwatch Bubble Set To Burst? (computerworld.com)

tripleevenfall writes: Pebble is laying off 25% of its employees -- that's 40 pink slips -- taking it down to just 80 people. It seems indicative of the smartwatch market's terrible state. Previously the darling of the crowdfunding fraternity -- it raised over $30 million on Kickstarter -- Pebble is finding it hard to keep the plates spinning in 2016.
The layoffs were confirmed by Pebble's CEO Eric Migicovsky, who implied that venture capitalists are now less keen on funding the smartwatch category.

Comments

Huh? Was there a smartwatch bubble to begin with?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure how a product that hasn't received widespread adoption and hasn't been promoted that much could be considered a bubble...

Submitter can't math

[voights]

Wouldn't that necessarily take it down to 120 people from 160?

Really?

[MachineShedFred]

Let me get this right:
1. Company A makes gadget that is an answer to a question nobody asked.
2. Company A gets press for selling said gadget to early adopters who buy it just to have it, but it still doesn't solve a problem that anyone has.
3. Massive consumer electronics companies (Samsung, Apple, LG, Motorola) get in on the action, creating massive competition for a small market, growing it marginally and creating new features that make the product marginally more useful.
4. Company A now has a product that is less featured, and is not as quick to replace with a more full featured product due to resource constraints, and sales plummet.
5. Company A is forced to lay people off due to the inevitable economics of their situation.
6. "The smartwatch bubble set to burst" doom and gloom story.

Slashdot editors are fucking amazing.