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Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

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Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#21

The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. With so many high profile VC backed (Fitbit, GoPro, Hello, Juicero, Coin, Pearl, ect.) and kickstarted (Lily.ai, Pebble) failures, no one is willing to risk it.

Why do the big corps succeed (Google, Apple, Amazon) and the startups fail. I guess all three of those have had failed hardware products and successful one as well. So they can afford a failure? Startups just need more runway?

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#22

The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. With so many high profile VC backed (Fitbit, GoPro, Hello, Juicero, Coin, Pearl, ect.) and kickstarted (Lily.ai, Pebble) failures, no one is willing to risk it.

GoPro is a failure?

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#23

The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. With so many high profile VC backed (Fitbit, GoPro, Hello, Juicero, Coin, Pearl, ect.) and kickstarted (Lily.ai, Pebble) failures, no one is willing to risk it.

Smart hardware belongs to big players only. A hardware company needs to deal with, Design, Engineering, Marketing, Production, Sales, Customer services, etc... If any of those step is messed up, the product is over. This is why I don't recommend anyone to get involved in this kind of business.

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#24
post #21

The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. With so many high profile VC backed (Fitbit, GoPro, Hello, Juicero, Coin, Pearl, ect.) and kickstarted (Lily.ai, Pebble) failures, no one is willing to risk it.

Why do the big corps succeed (Google, Apple, Amazon) and the startups fail. I guess all three of those have had failed hardware products and successful one as well. So they can afford a failure? Startups just need more runway?

The big companies have a lot more money and brand behind their products. Usually they've got a massive ecosystem to keep it afloat.

It doesn't mean that they don't fail tho.

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#26
post #15

Second time today we see reporting on SF tech startup woes (see SoundCloud as well). In case it's helpful, http://www.layoff-aid.com is avaiiable for SF tech talent affected by downsizing in both cases. What an epidemic.

Hired.com is pretty good too. I'm now happily working at a low-key company that I would've never heard about thanks to Hired.

Awesome. Haven't used them. Curious to hear how long it took you from signup to signing, and whether or not you were employed while you were searching.

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#27
A friend of mine quit this company after working there for 3 months. As a PM, she mentioned that it was impossible for her to do any meaningful work. Mind you, this was back in 2014, when they were doing fairly well. She even removed traces of working there from her LinkedIn. Speaks a lot about the company.

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#28

The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. With so many high profile VC backed (Fitbit, GoPro, Hello, Juicero, Coin, Pearl, ect.) and kickstarted (Lily.ai, Pebble) failures, no one is willing to risk it.

I'd ascribe the failure to the commodification of the fitness tracker and increasingly platform-driven smart speaker space. Here are some companies that have raised big rounds recently:

+ SimpliSafe raised $57M from Sequoia

+ Ring raised $100M+ from DFJ

+ Formlabs raised $50M from Foundry

+ Sphero raised $23M in April

+ Anki raised $52.5M in PE

I'm not sure what the future holds for Anki/Sphero, but the first three examples have what GoPro/FitBit didn't — a clear recurring business model. This is a good blog post on the subject:

https://blog.bolt.io/the-3-business-models-that-matter-for-c...

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#29
post #21

The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. With so many high profile VC backed (Fitbit, GoPro, Hello, Juicero, Coin, Pearl, ect.) and kickstarted (Lily.ai, Pebble) failures, no one is willing to risk it.

Why do the big corps succeed (Google, Apple, Amazon) and the startups fail. I guess all three of those have had failed hardware products and successful one as well. So they can afford a failure? Startups just need more runway?

Big corporations are ok with costs of creating a low margin hardware product because it is loss leader to other products and services with higher margins.

Bringing a hardware product to market costs a minimum of $7m in the US. At Seed/Series A, this is a huge amount of money for investors to swallow.

Re: Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup

#30
post #27

A friend of mine quit this company after working there for 3 months. As a PM, she mentioned that it was impossible for her to do any meaningful work. Mind you, this was back in 2014, when they were doing fairly well. She even removed traces of working there from her LinkedIn. Speaks a lot about the company.

> She even removed traces of working there from her LinkedIn. Speaks a lot about the company.

Or it tells you that people don't like explaining short employment stints to potential employers, probably out of fear that the potential employer will think they were fired.

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