Jawbone is being liquidated as its CEO launches a related health startup • Hacker News Board

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

#111

Post by Pulcinella » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:23 AM UTC

danso wrote: post #88

shas3 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the problem with hardware startups is more subtle. Unless you open up a fundamentally new market segment or find a niche application, your product is asking to be commodified. Smartwatches and fitness trackers were too obvious a category and Samsung, Apple, etc. were sure to swoop in and win. There really is no distinguishing feature for Jawbone or Fitbit. Other hardware startups like Anki are doing stuff tha…

What about hardware that doesn't so directly rely on an information network, such as sous vide (Anova was recently acquired [0]) and appliances like the Roomba? e.g. I'm sure Google engineers could eventually design a great sous vide, but not much about a sous vide does is amplified by the Google ecosystem. I suppose those kinds of things, as useful and coveted as they are by their fans, could reach elite status in t…

Roomba came out in 2002 so it predates the current round of VC hardware companies by quite a number of years. I feel like Roomba has been around long enough that they have strong brand recognition, even if their product is cloned and commodified.

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

#112

Post by bschwindHN » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:45 AM UTC

jlarocco wrote: post #78

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GoPro closed today at 8 a share, a $1.1bn valuation [1]. They went public in 2014 at 24 (about a $3.3bn valuation) after raising a round in 2012 from Foxconn at a $2.25bn valuation. Their revenues are falling and their operations losing cash. They have $75 million of cash on their balance sheet, less than their Q1 2017 net loss. [1] https://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AGPRO&ei=fNBeWcCjCc...

It's not fair to say GoPro has failed simply because investors and traders had unrealistic expectations. The "action camera" market was already saturated in 2014, and it's hard to imagine how they would continue growing at their previous rate when they're selling replacements and minor upgrades. It's possible they're in the process of failing, but it wouldn't surprise me if trying to meet unrealistic expectations cau…

Agreed that it's unfair to call it a failure. GoPro is what most people think of when you suggest filming something sports-related. They made a product which does what it says it does, and has become a very recognizable brand for action filming. Nothing lasts forever, I'd mark their efforts a success.

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

#113

Post by wvenable » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:48 AM UTC

joshvm wrote: post #62

yueq wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

The reasons that these products fail is usually feature creep. Whether due to Kickstarter stretch goals, or pressure from VCs, people don't know when to draw the line and ship. That's followed closely by underestimating costs and under-pricing products. After that you have the risk of developing the product you want, not the product that everyone else needs. I would never suggest anyone starts a hardware business unt…

> The reasons that these products fail is usually feature creep.

That's part of the reason Pebble failed; they were forced (like from pressure from VCs) to expand their business and they really over extended.

But more than that, I think Pebble was dead the moment Apple, Samsung, and the other big players jumped into the market. Pebble's first mover advantage was destroyed almost immediately by the technology and marketing might of those companies.

Software is often harder for big companies and easier for small companies. Hardware works the other way.

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

#114

Post by charlieflowers » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:51 AM UTC

iamleppert wrote: post #97

"Jawbone Health is at the forefront of revolutionizing primary care for millions of patients worldwide. Combining more than 20 years of proprietary wearable technology with clinically relevant signals, Jawbone Health connects patients and physicians like never before with continuous, data-driven dialogue." How exactly is a company that just started from the ashes of a glorified bluetooth speaker company revolutionizi…

Right? I found myself wondering what the wearable technology of 20 years ago really was. A skinny, awkward teen with a 50 pound CRT TV strapped to his back?

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

#115

Post by TheCondor » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:51 AM UTC

pcsanwald wrote: post #38

Hydraulix989 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's so easy for Shenzhen to just copy them though. There's nothing defensible about hardware.

honest question: why then did no one copy the iPod, and no one has copied the iPhone with any success? as soon as the iPod came out way back in the day, the criticism was that it would soon be copied. No one ever did, and I worked in the music business at the time and was familiar with everything on the market. nothing ever came close, apple made a ton of money. it's a common thing to say that it's not defensible/can…

Well it was copied by zune and probably others. The part of the equation that is glossed over is iPod provided a soup to nuts media product. You didn't have to mess around MP3 or aac encoding stuff, they have a portal with a staggering amount of content that you could just click and download to your iPod.

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

#116

Post by pocketsquare2 » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:55 AM UTC

SaltyMaia wrote: post #47

tokyoSurfer wrote: post #36

The problem with fitness trackers and smartwatches is that each and every brand keeps adding unnecessary features to the stack. They won't listen to users and keep building devices that have no market. Most of those companies created a product that was good and needed a good amount of work to make it better. But it seems that developers and management felt that simple = bad, and worked their asses off to add useless…

"They won't listen to users and keep building devices that have no market" You just listed an idea according to yourself with literally no market data or budgetary notions. Of course you would do better than any of the companies that actually know what it means working this stuff >And this opinion is shared by many of people I know Unfortunately "people this guy knows" isn't a real market and has no bearing on whethe…

it is always easier to criticize than to create

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

#117

Post by m-j-fox » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 3:55 AM UTC

tajen wrote: post #41

Hydraulix989 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's so easy for Shenzhen to just copy them though. There's nothing defensible about hardware.

Note that if Shenzen companies started publishing proposals on Kickstarter, they could make a success: Compared to SV products which get delivered in a year or two, they could churn prototypes in a few weeks, build confidence with investors and repeat. I hear people screaming "but they're not reliable/trustworthy!", but you can build trustworthiness by delivering bigger and bigger products, and, actually, Kickstarter…

We're still doing Kickstarter? Thought we all got burned on that AR/wifi deal and never went back.

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

#118

Post by pocketsquare2 » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 4:04 AM UTC

EpicEng wrote: post #80

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The days of consumer hardware company's access to startup capital is over. So I haven't worked at a hardware start-up but it seemed pretty difficult even before these companies to raise funding versus a pure software play. I'm not necessarily convinced this makes it easier or harder. Is there a specific reason you think it will be harder now? Also, for what it's worth, Fitbit and GoPro are still going. I'm convince…

I worked at a VC funded hardware start up for the first eight years of my career. You'll never read about it here though; we made digital pathology scanners. When I left we had sold the company for ~300M and were bringing in about ~30M / year in revenue. I guess my point is that there is more going on in the VC space then you'll read about on HN.

It would be really fantastic to hear more if you're willing to share!

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

#119

Post by andrewalan » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 4:10 AM UTC

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

#120

Post by spiralpolitik » Fri, Jul 07, 2017, 4:14 AM UTC

djrogers wrote: post #101

KekDemaga wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The iPod touch is essentially an iPhone without a cellular connection.

But the iPod Touch didn’t crush Archos, diamond, and Rio. It came about after the iPhone was in the market...

According to Wikipedia both Diamond and Archos players were DOA by 2005, two years before the iPhone was released. Creative struggled on for a few years post iPhone. 2005 was the year of the iPod Photo and the iPod Video, although the beginning of the iPod as multi-function device started in 2002 with addition of the PDA functionality.

By 2006 Apple had 72-74% of the MP3 player market, with SanDisk, Creative, Zune, Sony, Samsung, and other accounting for the remainder. I seem to recall most of the damage was done by the iPod Mini.