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?

Re:Submitter can't math

[drakaan]

...to which the answer would be 33 1/3 %, not 25%.

Math?

[Y2K is bogus]

80+40=120
40/120=33.33%

So they are laying off 33.33% of their staff, not 25%.

Re:Math?

[marcansoft]

TFA says:

Pebble is letting 40 people go -- that's 25% of its workforce

Which implies had 160 people to begin with, and they let 40 go, leaving them with 120. As usual, the bad math came from Slashdot.

Re:Math?

[Chrisq]

80+40=120 40/120=33.33%

So they are laying off 33.33% of their staff, not 25%.

But they checked it on the Smartwatch calculator..

Hmm, and I thought that they were above average...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I would certainly expect Pebble to be less insulated from any downturn/loss of confidence than the internal teams doing 'smartwatch' at Apple, Google, or any of the Android OEMs, since they neither have a large host organism to quietly hide losses in, nor any claims to some sort of 'product synergy' nonsense; but my impression(if anyone has actual data, either for or against this, I'd be interested to know) was that Pebble had been atypically successful given the rather narrow appeal of the 'smartwatch' concept with their size and battery life friendly keep-it-simple-stupid design and relatively broad compatibility.

Is my impression wrong; and Pebble is actually starting to suffer as competing products with tighter 'ecosystem' tie-ins have gotten vaguely more competent and less in need of being nearly cellphone sized to get even a day's battery life? Is my impression correct; but either Pebble or their backers, or both, can't really think of too many additional incremental improvements to the KISS-based design that would be worth the cost of keeping the extra staff? Was the market simply so tiny that the few people who wanted one are already saturated and everybody is having issues moving product?

Re:Huh? Was there a smartwatch bubble to begin wit

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

It wasn't a very big bubble; but the hype-to-substance ratio was arguably large enough to qualify as a small one. It didn't survive contact with reality for long; but there was a brief period of delusional hope among the manufacturers and some of the talking heads that 'smartwatch' was going to be the must-have accessory and temporary reprieve from the pressure on profits caused by the fact that everyone who wants a smartphone and a tablet either already has one or is poor enough that their desire for one isn't too helpful.

Definitely not at the level of "zOMG 3D TV! It will surely cause everyone to re-buy their television!"; but same basic hopeful delusion that a new gimmick could save them from an increasingly saturated and commodified market.

Re: Huh? Was there a smartwatch bubble to begin wi

[AuMatar]

No, that's the problem- it isn't. The number of people who want to wear a watch is incredibly small. You have a small number who have to due to job (nurses, for example)- but they don't need a smartwatch, they just need a hands free second hand. You have a small set who wear it as a fashion statement, but they want metals and gems and fancy that will last a long time, not an electronic screen that will last 2 years.

The number of people who actually want a smartwatch is ridiculously small- single digit percents of the population, possibly less. Everyone else is ok taking their phone out of their pocket.

Re:Hmm, and I thought that they were above average

[guacamole]

When it comes to battery life, NOTHING on the market can beat Pebble's first generation Pebble Watch and Pebble Watch Steel. Both of them are actually pretty light, and the Steel is sort of a watch you can wear to a dinner. Both can go a week on a full charge. Even Pebble's own second generation Time and Time Steel run time took a hit when they introduced the color screen.

While I love my Pebble Steel, I do fear Pebble will eventually go down the way of Palm Inc, Walkman, Blueberry and others.

The fact that nobody else followed Apple...

[Hadlock]

...Is a pretty strong sign that there's zero interest in digital wearables.
 
It's been pretty definitively proven that you can't reliably use a smartphone (or smart-device) with a screen smaller than 480 x 360 and about 2.4" (the screen on the most popular Blackberry, the "Curve" in the 2007-2010 era).
 
Everyone who absolutely needed a smart watch bought one with the initial roll out of the Pebbl and iWatch. People buying it now are simply either just now able to afford one, or...?
 
Even Apple themselves have said that 4" is about the ideal size for a portable smart device screen. Given that 27-45mm is the ideal size for a watch face, that's way, WAY too small to do what people think it can do.
 
I can see smart bracelets monitoring heartbeat and miles walked, but it's been pretty conclusively proven that average citizens will never wear a screen of any significant usefulness on their arm.

Re:The fact that nobody else followed Apple...

[JaredOfEuropa]

I've been playing with an Apple Watch for the past few weeks (doing an app development project at the moment), and I find it to be fairly useful, though it certainly is no game-changer. It is not meant to be a replacement smart device, it is meant to be a companion to one. That means you don't need a full screen and full functionality, just something that can display notifications and basic information. You're not going to be reading the news on that thing, but it'll vibrate and pop up the headline if there's a breaking story, for example. Personally I found it useful for navigating a strange city (on foot); you can access Apple Maps on the watch and have it display directions. Way easier han walking around holding your phone, and the small screen provides enough space for usable directions.

What I really like about the watch is the vibrate function. I leave my phone on silent most of the time, and when it is in my pocket or lying around the house somewhere I often miss calls. But the watch' vibration is impossible to miss.

But the fact that the watch is a companion also means that its appeal will probably be very limited. Make your smart watch too expensive and most people will not want to buy one to gain a handful of mildly convenient but nonessential features. Make it too cheap and it'll look horrible as an accessory. Pebble make a good effort with their watches, but as watches go they still don't look very good. If I really wanted a smart watch, I'd pay 4 figures for one that looks really good, I mean classical watch good. Something in titanium or gold. But not if the innards will be obsolete in a few years. Unless manufacturers can find ways to make the electronics swappable so people can keep the case, these watches will be too ugly or expensive to find widespread use.

Re:Hmm, and I thought that they were above average

[MMC Monster]

Pebble is this generation's Palm. A great product which did what it did well.

Destroyed by inferior products from bigger companies with color screens and more integration.

Re:Hmm, and I thought that they were above average

[swb]

I take my watch off to go through security at the airport and when I have sex. I'm married and I seldom travel.

In my opinion, battery life should be measured against quartz watches -- years. Or compared to my self-winding Tag or my Seiko solar quartz -- never, bounded by my lifetime.

Until then I don't see the utility. I've learned to ignore my smartphone -- I have all but the narrowest list of VIPs set to provide any notifications and keep it muted and on vibrate all the time, so I'm not interested in glancing at my watch to find out what the latest distraction is.

Plus, cost versus obsolescence? My Tag was an expensive gift, but it will also last my lifetime and never stop working because battery or vendor or software. Same with my Seiko. Any "smart watch" will be obsolete in a couple of years, which seems like a lot to spend for something you just know will be unsupported and unusable.

Re: Huh? Was there a smartwatch bubble to begin wi

[rasmusbr]

"The number of people who want to wear a watch is extremely high"

LMAO. Really. Thanks for the laugh. I work for a university and get to interact with many people on a daily basis, and I use public transportation for most of my commute. I can count on one hand (and have fingers left over) the number of people wearing a watch.

Sounds like a local cultural thing where you live.

The wristwatch is currently a multi-billion dollar industry and (perhaps surprisingly) shows no sign of declining.

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.

Re:They are still the #1 smartwatch

[MachineShedFred]

Really? [Citation needed]

Here's my citation to the contrary: http://techcrunch.com/2016/01/...

If Apple sold >50% of the smart watches that shifted in 2015, how is Pebble outselling that combined with all the Android Wear 2:1? Are you counting total sales since the absolute first unit left the factory? Even that doesn't pass the sniff test.