Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 66 posts

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#41

Post by bmj »

klenwell wrote: post #31
RBr wrote: post #12

Really? We're surprised by this? Camera phones with video recording capabilities are almost ubiquitous. More then that, they're cheaper and solve the primary usage case better then the portable Flip cameras do. Flip cameras provided better quality portable video and now that embedded mobile technology has caught up to that quality, justifying the price to carry around another device is difficult.

Camera phones probably made it inevitable. But Cisco certainly accelerated matters. I got a Flip camera phone 3 or 4 years back for Christmas. Great impulse buy. I think there was only 1 model. Less than $100. Didn't use it that much but still loved it. Girlfriend, too. Great for trips. Loved it so much that when it crapped out, we decided to get a new one this year, even though we both have good smartphones. Now the…

Agreed. We got one from our ISP when we signed up for fiber. Not sure I would actually buy one, given that my wife has an iPhone, but the Flip has been very useful.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#43

Post by ChuckMcM »

martincmartin wrote: post #4
senthilnayagam wrote: post #3

I own 2 flips and I love the simplicity, I share it with my kids and extended family for all occassions. Cisco is positioning itself as enterprise networking company. They should not kill the Flip business, selling it is a good option.

As the article says: "In a world where consumers can now record and stream video directly from their iPhone, Android or BlackBerry phone, Flip’s video camera business is no longer novel or useful."

I've never been "inside" the loop on one of these decisions and I find them fascinating. If you've bought a company and you can't make it work, and it has to go, it would seem you have three options:

1) Sell off the assets, let the people go, and sub lease the space.

2) Sell the team and its products to another company.

3) Divest yourself of the company and assets by selling it back to the original founders.

You're going to write off your purchase regardless and for a company like Cisco it will comfortably keep them from paying tax in the US for a year or two perhaps.

But lets say you sell it back to the original (if they are around) management team. How would you structure such a deal? If you were one of those managers what would you need to ask for? Clearly you need some working capital because you'll have material in inventory and in the pipeline. You need to retain the manufacturer contracts (or a modified contract if they are more generic) and you need some space to hold the team.

Seems like option #1 is quick, painful (you lay off 550 people in this example) and you have a lot off excess material to dump / dispose at a loss.

I tried to buy one of my patents back from Sun (they were never going to use it) and that was a complete waste of time. So I wonder how one evaluates the impact to the business of these choices. Anyone here been in that situation and chosen option 2 or 3 ? Did it work out? Not? Did you wish you had chosen option 1 ?

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#44

Post by nradov »

JonnieCache wrote: post #35
krschultz wrote: post #9

I really think the GoPro killed them. If I want good quality video, I need something better than a Flip. If I need a durable, small, device for getting some OK video, I'll get a goPro. If I need OK video quality and don't care about durability, I'll use my smart phone. When I'm out skiing, I see half the teenagers with GoPro's mounted on their helmets, their ski poles, chest harnesses etc video taping each other hitt…

I can vouch for this. "Extreme" sports practitioners are divided into two groups: those who own a GoPro, and those who covet them.

Now if only GoPro would produce a lens that could focus properly underwater I think all of my scuba diving friends would buy one.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#45

Post by xbryanx »

Flips are a pretty great tool in an informal educational setting where you wanna just hand some one a dumb simple device with a record button. I understand that this was never a big enough market to sustain the product, but the ed. world will mourn the loss of these devices.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#46

Post by xinsight »

roc wrote: post #22
xinsight wrote: post #13

Did the HD video capability of mobile phones (e.g. iPhone 4) kill the Flip? If so, this has happened before; Pure Digital's first product was a cheap point-and-shoot camera that you'd take in for processing, but it was also beaten by the rise of (equally poor quality) cellphone cameras. Interesting take-away from a user experience perspective. A dedicated device that is famously easy to use, still loses out to more c…

> "A dedicated device that is famously easy to use, still loses out to more complicated devices that do everything." There's something of a gadget axiom in there. Casual users are, by definition, not interested in the fiddly bits. Thus they value the results over the process, the tools or the craft. Thus they are most-willing to abandon a dedicated device for a good-enough multifunction, if for no other reason than t…

> It's the two-tap "upload to youtube/vimeo/facebook" that did them in.

Great point. For sharing, connecting to a computer via USB isn't nearly as nice as tapping a couple of buttons. (But Flip was easier to point and shoot. No hunting for the photo app, loading it, switching to video, etc.)

re: gadget axiom - I've also heard about the "pocket exception": Devices with many functions lose out to specialized devices - except when the device can fit in your pocket. (Sorry, can't find the source.)

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#48

Post by tomkarlo »

jsavimbi wrote: post #23
dr_ wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mmmm...I think it's more likely all the smartphones out there that now have decent enough video capabilities for most people.

For most people, yes. I think the all-in-one packages of phone, mp3 player and camera has put a dent in the bottom line of any low-end single-use device. I bought a Kodak Zi8 back in '09 and to be honest I've only really used it once. The camera on the iPhone can't compete with it, but for a multi-purpose device I'd much rather have a GoPro. I guess Flip failed to take notice that a niche was driving the market.

I had the Zi8 too. The iPhone 4 shoots better video in my experience, and allows me better ability to review / edit / share on the fly.

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#49

Post by dools »

I'm glad I got my flip before they shut it down! It's been a tremendous asset in catching all my daughter's big moments so far. The value for me is in how quickly it boots up and starts recording, the fact that it's on a completely separate battery to my phone, has a good picture, steady cam and plays nice with iPhoto. It also came with a nice little tripod that we set up at christmas/birthday to catch the opening of presents. Whilst one could certainly solve the problem with a smart phone I've enjoyed having a dedicated device for all this.

EDIT: accidentally submitted half finished last sentence then went through a train tunnel hence delay in completion :)

Re: Cisco To Shut Down Flip Video Business; Will Give Pink Slips To 550 Employees

#50

Post by tomkarlo »

eddmc wrote: post #39

The Flip's strength is it's simplicity. Sorry, but I don't buy the idea elsewhere on this thread that Camera phones (w/ video recording) or GoPro's have captured this market. Yes, they both cover some of it, but lets face it we're the geeks - we're likely to spend money on the latest gadget. The use case I want to suggest is my parents (in their early 60's). They both have cell phones, but they are not smartphones (t…

Smartphones don't have to be directly comparable to the specialist device in order to make them uneconomic. Even if they're only 50% as good, for people that own one, they're essentially free. So for a lot of folks who might have gotten a Flip but didn't really have a pressing need for one, they're now going to just limp along with the non-dedicated device and save $100. Suddenly your market is 25-50% smaller and you can't sell at as low a price any more... so you raise your price and make your market even smaller, or get out of that business.
Post reply on HN