8 ms·

Smartwatch firm Pebble lays off 25% of its staff

83 points by Rifu 11y ago

BinaryIdiot 11y ago
I can't say I'm surprised. They hired a lot of people for a niche product that isn't a huge seller. Sure it sells pretty well for what it is but, at least from the outside, it never looked like it could support the huge influx of people that they hired. Also the number one complaint about the Pebble that constantly comes up with every single release is the huge bezel and then their latest watch, the round, almost appears as if it has more bezel. Sorry but I just don't think it looks attractive that way and I honestly really want one.
hkmurakami 11y ago
>Smartwatch pioneer Pebble is laying off 25 percent of its staff amid increased financial concerns. >letting 40 of Pebble’s 120 employees go. What the math?
- diminish 11y ago
  40/120 = 33% except misreporting, another possibility is that there was a previous layoff. Like 120 to 107 (~11%) and then from 107 to 80 which is ~25%.
- skrebbel 11y ago
  I guess it's not commonly known in HN circles, but hardware startups often measure their staff in kilograms because it's an SI unit.
  - staticelf 11y ago
    This comment was funny.
- mikekchar 11y ago
  No idea, but is it possible there were actually 160 employees and the count after layoff was 120 employees? That would be 25%.
hauget 11y ago
If they could get rid of that horrible bezel design, more people would probably buy their product. I still can't understand how they shipped the round with that HUGE bezel. WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?! Did no one want to tell Eric that that was a bad idea or was he just stubborn in wanting to ship it like that? Also, what was up with their terrible website design? SEE THIS FOR CONTEXT --> https://web.archive.org/web/20141230224643/https://getpebble.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20141230224643/https://getpebble... I mean, I know they wanted it to look friendly but it made Pebble look like it was marketing a toy (or something specifically for nerds), and not a well designed consumer product. Honestly, there's a lot of talented people at Pebble, but their vision IMHO has just been the wrong one. I still think they should partner with someone like Timex, Casio or Garmin and ship something like an F-91W or a G-Shock with PebbleOS. That would be really interesting. Hell, if they partnered with Garmin they could probably build an awesome developer community around solid HW. All this said, I really admire Eric and the rest of the staff at Pebble. They've put in a lot of hard work to ship something functional, BUT they really need to rethink how they're marketing themselves, who they're marketing to and what the vision of the company/product should be if they intend to survive.
- diminish 11y ago
  Maybe noone needs a watch neither a smart one, anymore?
- semi-extrinsic 11y ago
  Lots of the smartwatch manufacturers appear to have engineers and designers who've never actually used watches all that much. The Fitbit is another great example of hardware fail: both of my parents and one of my brothers bought a Fitbit Surge about a year ago. In the last month, the strap broke on all three. Well, that's typical for a plastic strap watch, just buy a new strap. Oh no, the strap actually contains antennas and stuff, so you can't! So all three were returned to the shop as warranty claims. Thanks to good consumer protection laws, my parents got Samsung Gear, and my brother a Garmin, instead of defectively designed hardware. The man at the shop said they were getting Fitbit returns at a rate of about five a week.
- david-given 11y ago
philippnagel 11y ago
I am currently thinking getting a cheap one from eBay. How deeply integrated is the product into the company - will the product still be useful in case Pebble goes bust? Can one side load apps?
- fredley 11y ago
  You can side-load apps, but the watch is very tightly dependent on the phone apps - without them it's essentially just a regular watch. If Pebble were to go bust, I'd hope they'd at least open-source the api. Unless they do this, the minute an Android/iOS update breaks the Pebble app the watches become useless.
donkeyd 11y ago
They're shifting their focus to health, which really concerns me. I've been a Pebble user since day 1 and mostly love the idea of smart watches because they can be a very easy way to get information. Unfortunately, Apple is keeping their API's closed off, because of which Pebble is crippled on iOS. I have the feeling that this lack of good integration is forcing them to focus on health.
adrianN 11y ago
I never understood the appeal of smart watches. Aren't they like tiny screens for the phone in your pocket? Why can't you just use the phone? I don't own a smart phone either, but I understand why you would want one. But with smart watches I'm at a complete loss. Can some smart watch owner please explain what they like about having the watch?
- sdrothrock 11y ago
  > Can some smart watch owner please explain what they like about having the watch? I ended up abandoning the platform for various reasons, but 1. It stopped my phantom leg tingle, where I'd feel like my phone was vibrating. This was a huge psychological plus for me. 2. It's a lot less intrusive to check my watch socially than it is to pull out my phone, unlock it, drag down the blind, check the notification, etc. 3. Being able to change the watch face on a whim was really appealing. I loved having a quick way to check the time/date/next train. 4. The voice reply was useful when I had my hands full, but I only really used it a dozen or so times.
  - idreyn 11y ago
    To your second point, I have grown up with smartphones around me for close to half my life and in my peer group it isn't considered rude to occasionally check your phone and maybe peck out a quick response. By contrast, I've found that people with smartwatches are often looking at their watch, which is a gesture that is hardwired in my brain to mean "what time is it"/"I'm in a hurry"/"you're wasting my time". It's a very subtle thing, to the point where it has made me mildly anxious about interactions without consciously understanding why. If smartwatches really catch on, it will take time for me to mentally re-bind that gesture to mean something less rude.
- jon-wood 11y ago
  It is indeed a tiny screen for the phone in my pocket, which allows me to interact with my phone without necessarily having to take it out. Here's a few ways in which I use it: * In the kitchen to time cooking, to save getting half cooked food on my phone. * To have a quick glance at incoming notifications while walking. * To send quick replies to some of those notifications. * To check the time (its not only a smart watch, but also just a watch). * To track how much sleep I'm getting, and the quality of that sleep. * To track my exercise, both while running with real time information from my phone, and passively tracking how much walking I do. * To control music I'm listening to in the shower. * To give me at a glance directions when Google Maps is navigating for me, rather than walking around staring at my phone.
koder2016 11y ago
It's like building a company around Tamagotchi only without something as revolutionary.
- Retr0spectrum 11y ago
  I wonder why Tamagotchi didn't go for a watch design.
david-given 11y ago
I just bought a PTS, to replace an LG G Android Wear watch which I can no longer stand. It's slightly terrifying how much better the PTS is that the G, in every possible aspect, despite technically being worse. It's got less RAM, it's got a slower processor, it's got a smaller screen, it doesn't have a touchscreen... but somehow it ends up being a vastly nicer and more useful thing than the G. I think that partly it's to do with different expectations. The PTS feels like a watch with lots of cool features. The Wear feels like a lobotomised smartphone which would frustrate me every time I use it. But there's a lot of really careful design in the Pebble which is missing from the G. The UI is amazingly fast --- you never have to wait for it, ever (unlike the G). It's well designed and I can find things, unlike the G with it's weird U-shaped settings menu. I control it by pressing buttons, which is fast and reliable and, critically, means that the screen's not covered by my fingers; the G was controlled by sloppy touchscreen swipes that it wasn't very good at recognising. Also, the PTS has a 10-day battery life and a screen that I can see in direct sunlight. (The PTS screen is a thing of beauty. It's a reflective Sharp Memory LCD, and you can see it in direct sunlight. Like, it looks really good in direct sunlight. The colours have this metallic tint to them which the UI design shows off nicely. It's small, but so, so much nicer than the G's screen.)
- teekert 11y ago
  I agree, my pts feels like a nice watch, a good watch with well visible screen in any conditions. What you get extra is: Notification, alarms, bike computer, ski-tracker, music controller (includes Sonos), step counter, sleep tracker. Mine consistently gets a 12 day battery life. It can even be stretched to 14 probably because at the end it goes into watch only mode. I love it much more than I could have imagined in advance. Just expect a nice watch, not a small smartphone. I even got it becuase I wanted a watch, my alternative was a Casio with some features. I use my phone in a very different way now, I hardly turn on the screen anymore. I see if something is important right away (usually it is not) and I can leave it until I'm on the train for example.
jug 11y ago
Smartwatches always seemed like a fad to me. Part of the point with smartphones, at least to me, is to get rid of the watch. Smart or not. I used a watch throughout my youth and still remember when I got watch free. My wrists: free at last! It's also puzzling me a bit because the appeal of watches among people where e.g Apple is aiming their watches for given the price range, tend not to be about supporting the latest WiFi standards or whatnot, but the value of classic, mechanical, precise, designs.
- Spearchucker 11y ago
  It's very subjective. I have a Pebble that I never use, a Microsoft Band that I occasionally use, and a very, very expensive watch with an automatic movement that keeps bad time and I never look at - but I wear all the time. Which makes it a fashion accessory first, and a status symbol second. I imagine you can ask 5 people about their opinions and get 5 different answers.
mootothemax 11y ago
A large part of the problem is that companies are focussing more on the watch aspect and less on the smart-wrist-mounted-device aspect of such things - for me, at least. I have the feeling that there's a breakthrough "why didn't I think of that?" moment not too far in the distant future from now. Until then.
- dagw 11y ago
  A large part of the problem is that companies are focussing more on the watch aspect and less on the smart-wrist-mounted-device aspect of such things - for me, at least. Funny you should say that. I find a large part of the problem is that companies seem to be focusing more on the smart-wrist-mounted-device aspect and less on the watch aspect. I want a device that is a beautiful, high quality watch first and some smart-wrist-mounted-device aspects tastefully added to that. Until then.
RustyRussell 11y ago
I love my pebble but I wouldn't have bought one (it was a gift). The silent alarm (doesn't wake partner in the morning) and receiving messages while riding my bike to/from work with canned replies (mine are ETA 5,10 and 20) are the two things I've found valuable. But neither is life-changing, and I'm not sure if I'll replace this one should it fail.
rylest14 11y ago
I don't see the appeal of wearable tech. Google Glass was a huge flop and these smart watches aren't much better in my opinion. Plus, I'm a sucker for a traditionally crafted, Swiss-made watches!
greenspot 11y ago
I am so addicted to everything smart. My notebook, my smartphone, the Internet, all my apps, my PS4. From time to time I am such an heavy ADD, I can't focus for 10 minutes. To all smartwatch makers: I don't need another crackdevice on my wrist.
henson 11y ago
It's interesting how a large majority of people, even those most technologically-inclined and most likely to be early adopters, just don't warm to the idea of a smartwatch. Maybe it's the fact the hardware and software experience just isn't up to scratch, or in my personal case, maybe people just don't want that experience. It's not the awkward stigma of talking to or interacting with your watch in public, but it's the unnerving feeling of connectedness and intrusion. In fact, I wrote an article about just this last year: http://jh47.com/2015/04/09/Freedom-for-wrists/ http://jh47.com/2015/04/09/Freedom-for-wrists/
spdegabrielle 11y ago
they never monetised their apps?
Jemaclus 11y ago
I don't really have a lot to say about this article, but I do really love my Pebble watch. 99% of the time, it's just a watch -- who needs all the other fancy crap? But it has the nice features that make it worth it, the best of which is just the vibration when I get a text or call. I dunno. I think Apple Watch is overkill. But Pebble is just right. I hope they don't go out of business.
djloche 11y ago
PTS hardware was great, the OS was great, but phone/app/web part of the ecosystem just never really delivered and so I sold mine a few weeks ago.

83 points by Rifu 11y ago

I can't say I'm surprised. They hired a lot of people for a niche product that isn't a huge seller. Sure it sells pretty well for what it is but, at least from the outside, it never looked like it could support the huge influx of people that they hired. Also the number one complaint about the Pebble that constantly comes up with every single release is the huge bezel and then their latest watch, the round, almost appears as if it has more bezel. Sorry but I just don't think it looks attractive that way and I honestly really want one.

hkmurakami 11y ago

>Smartwatch pioneer Pebble is laying off 25 percent of its staff amid increased financial concerns. >letting 40 of Pebble’s 120 employees go. What the math?

diminish 11y ago
40/120 = 33% except misreporting, another possibility is that there was a previous layoff. Like 120 to 107 (~11%) and then from 107 to 80 which is ~25%.
skrebbel 11y ago
I guess it's not commonly known in HN circles, but hardware startups often measure their staff in kilograms because it's an SI unit.
- staticelf 11y ago
  This comment was funny.
mikekchar 11y ago
No idea, but is it possible there were actually 160 employees and the count after layoff was 120 employees? That would be 25%.

hauget 11y ago

If they could get rid of that horrible bezel design, more people would probably buy their product. I still can't understand how they shipped the round with that HUGE bezel. WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?! Did no one want to tell Eric that that was a bad idea or was he just stubborn in wanting to ship it like that? Also, what was up with their terrible website design? SEE THIS FOR CONTEXT --> https://web.archive.org/web/20141230224643/https://getpebble.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20141230224643/https://getpebble... I mean, I know they wanted it to look friendly but it made Pebble look like it was marketing a toy (or something specifically for nerds), and not a well designed consumer product. Honestly, there's a lot of talented people at Pebble, but their vision IMHO has just been the wrong one. I still think they should partner with someone like Timex, Casio or Garmin and ship something like an F-91W or a G-Shock with PebbleOS. That would be really interesting. Hell, if they partnered with Garmin they could probably build an awesome developer community around solid HW. All this said, I really admire Eric and the rest of the staff at Pebble. They've put in a lot of hard work to ship something functional, BUT they really need to rethink how they're marketing themselves, who they're marketing to and what the vision of the company/product should be if they intend to survive.

diminish 11y ago
Maybe noone needs a watch neither a smart one, anymore?
semi-extrinsic 11y ago
Lots of the smartwatch manufacturers appear to have engineers and designers who've never actually used watches all that much. The Fitbit is another great example of hardware fail: both of my parents and one of my brothers bought a Fitbit Surge about a year ago. In the last month, the strap broke on all three. Well, that's typical for a plastic strap watch, just buy a new strap. Oh no, the strap actually contains antennas and stuff, so you can't! So all three were returned to the shop as warranty claims. Thanks to good consumer protection laws, my parents got Samsung Gear, and my brother a Garmin, instead of defectively designed hardware. The man at the shop said they were getting Fitbit returns at a rate of about five a week.
david-given 11y ago

philippnagel 11y ago

I am currently thinking getting a cheap one from eBay. How deeply integrated is the product into the company - will the product still be useful in case Pebble goes bust? Can one side load apps?

fredley 11y ago
You can side-load apps, but the watch is very tightly dependent on the phone apps - without them it's essentially just a regular watch. If Pebble were to go bust, I'd hope they'd at least open-source the api. Unless they do this, the minute an Android/iOS update breaks the Pebble app the watches become useless.

donkeyd 11y ago

They're shifting their focus to health, which really concerns me. I've been a Pebble user since day 1 and mostly love the idea of smart watches because they can be a very easy way to get information. Unfortunately, Apple is keeping their API's closed off, because of which Pebble is crippled on iOS. I have the feeling that this lack of good integration is forcing them to focus on health.

adrianN 11y ago

I never understood the appeal of smart watches. Aren't they like tiny screens for the phone in your pocket? Why can't you just use the phone? I don't own a smart phone either, but I understand why you would want one. But with smart watches I'm at a complete loss. Can some smart watch owner please explain what they like about having the watch?

sdrothrock 11y ago
> Can some smart watch owner please explain what they like about having the watch? I ended up abandoning the platform for various reasons, but 1. It stopped my phantom leg tingle, where I'd feel like my phone was vibrating. This was a huge psychological plus for me. 2. It's a lot less intrusive to check my watch socially than it is to pull out my phone, unlock it, drag down the blind, check the notification, etc. 3. Being able to change the watch face on a whim was really appealing. I loved having a quick way to check the time/date/next train. 4. The voice reply was useful when I had my hands full, but I only really used it a dozen or so times.
- idreyn 11y ago
  To your second point, I have grown up with smartphones around me for close to half my life and in my peer group it isn't considered rude to occasionally check your phone and maybe peck out a quick response. By contrast, I've found that people with smartwatches are often looking at their watch, which is a gesture that is hardwired in my brain to mean "what time is it"/"I'm in a hurry"/"you're wasting my time". It's a very subtle thing, to the point where it has made me mildly anxious about interactions without consciously understanding why. If smartwatches really catch on, it will take time for me to mentally re-bind that gesture to mean something less rude.
jon-wood 11y ago
It is indeed a tiny screen for the phone in my pocket, which allows me to interact with my phone without necessarily having to take it out. Here's a few ways in which I use it: * In the kitchen to time cooking, to save getting half cooked food on my phone. * To have a quick glance at incoming notifications while walking. * To send quick replies to some of those notifications. * To check the time (its not only a smart watch, but also just a watch). * To track how much sleep I'm getting, and the quality of that sleep. * To track my exercise, both while running with real time information from my phone, and passively tracking how much walking I do. * To control music I'm listening to in the shower. * To give me at a glance directions when Google Maps is navigating for me, rather than walking around staring at my phone.

koder2016 11y ago

It's like building a company around Tamagotchi only without something as revolutionary.

Retr0spectrum 11y ago
I wonder why Tamagotchi didn't go for a watch design.

david-given 11y ago

I just bought a PTS, to replace an LG G Android Wear watch which I can no longer stand. It's slightly terrifying how much better the PTS is that the G, in every possible aspect, despite technically being worse. It's got less RAM, it's got a slower processor, it's got a smaller screen, it doesn't have a touchscreen... but somehow it ends up being a vastly nicer and more useful thing than the G. I think that partly it's to do with different expectations. The PTS feels like a watch with lots of cool features. The Wear feels like a lobotomised smartphone which would frustrate me every time I use it. But there's a lot of really careful design in the Pebble which is missing from the G. The UI is amazingly fast --- you never have to wait for it, ever (unlike the G). It's well designed and I can find things, unlike the G with it's weird U-shaped settings menu. I control it by pressing buttons, which is fast and reliable and, critically, means that the screen's not covered by my fingers; the G was controlled by sloppy touchscreen swipes that it wasn't very good at recognising. Also, the PTS has a 10-day battery life and a screen that I can see in direct sunlight. (The PTS screen is a thing of beauty. It's a reflective Sharp Memory LCD, and you can see it in direct sunlight. Like, it looks really good in direct sunlight. The colours have this metallic tint to them which the UI design shows off nicely. It's small, but so, so much nicer than the G's screen.)

teekert 11y ago
I agree, my pts feels like a nice watch, a good watch with well visible screen in any conditions. What you get extra is: Notification, alarms, bike computer, ski-tracker, music controller (includes Sonos), step counter, sleep tracker. Mine consistently gets a 12 day battery life. It can even be stretched to 14 probably because at the end it goes into watch only mode. I love it much more than I could have imagined in advance. Just expect a nice watch, not a small smartphone. I even got it becuase I wanted a watch, my alternative was a Casio with some features. I use my phone in a very different way now, I hardly turn on the screen anymore. I see if something is important right away (usually it is not) and I can leave it until I'm on the train for example.

jug 11y ago

Smartwatches always seemed like a fad to me. Part of the point with smartphones, at least to me, is to get rid of the watch. Smart or not. I used a watch throughout my youth and still remember when I got watch free. My wrists: free at last! It's also puzzling me a bit because the appeal of watches among people where e.g Apple is aiming their watches for given the price range, tend not to be about supporting the latest WiFi standards or whatnot, but the value of classic, mechanical, precise, designs.

Spearchucker 11y ago
It's very subjective. I have a Pebble that I never use, a Microsoft Band that I occasionally use, and a very, very expensive watch with an automatic movement that keeps bad time and I never look at - but I wear all the time. Which makes it a fashion accessory first, and a status symbol second. I imagine you can ask 5 people about their opinions and get 5 different answers.

mootothemax 11y ago

A large part of the problem is that companies are focussing more on the watch aspect and less on the smart-wrist-mounted-device aspect of such things - for me, at least. I have the feeling that there's a breakthrough "why didn't I think of that?" moment not too far in the distant future from now. Until then.

dagw 11y ago
A large part of the problem is that companies are focussing more on the watch aspect and less on the smart-wrist-mounted-device aspect of such things - for me, at least. Funny you should say that. I find a large part of the problem is that companies seem to be focusing more on the smart-wrist-mounted-device aspect and less on the watch aspect. I want a device that is a beautiful, high quality watch first and some smart-wrist-mounted-device aspects tastefully added to that. Until then.

RustyRussell 11y ago

I love my pebble but I wouldn't have bought one (it was a gift). The silent alarm (doesn't wake partner in the morning) and receiving messages while riding my bike to/from work with canned replies (mine are ETA 5,10 and 20) are the two things I've found valuable. But neither is life-changing, and I'm not sure if I'll replace this one should it fail.

rylest14 11y ago

I don't see the appeal of wearable tech. Google Glass was a huge flop and these smart watches aren't much better in my opinion. Plus, I'm a sucker for a traditionally crafted, Swiss-made watches!

greenspot 11y ago

I am so addicted to everything smart. My notebook, my smartphone, the Internet, all my apps, my PS4. From time to time I am such an heavy ADD, I can't focus for 10 minutes. To all smartwatch makers: I don't need another crackdevice on my wrist.

henson 11y ago

It's interesting how a large majority of people, even those most technologically-inclined and most likely to be early adopters, just don't warm to the idea of a smartwatch. Maybe it's the fact the hardware and software experience just isn't up to scratch, or in my personal case, maybe people just don't want that experience. It's not the awkward stigma of talking to or interacting with your watch in public, but it's the unnerving feeling of connectedness and intrusion. In fact, I wrote an article about just this last year: http://jh47.com/2015/04/09/Freedom-for-wrists/ http://jh47.com/2015/04/09/Freedom-for-wrists/

spdegabrielle 11y ago

they never monetised their apps?

Jemaclus 11y ago

I don't really have a lot to say about this article, but I do really love my Pebble watch. 99% of the time, it's just a watch -- who needs all the other fancy crap? But it has the nice features that make it worth it, the best of which is just the vibration when I get a text or call. I dunno. I think Apple Watch is overkill. But Pebble is just right. I hope they don't go out of business.

djloche 11y ago

PTS hardware was great, the OS was great, but phone/app/web part of the ecosystem just never really delivered and so I sold mine a few weeks ago.