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That story has already been beaten to death....lol. Nest bought out Revolv - and then immediately ceased all sales. They then kept the servers running for ano

That story has already been beaten to death....lol. Nest bought out Revolv - and then immediately ceased all sales. They then kept the servers running for another 18 months, before announcing they were going to shut them down. Revolv was an also-ran in the home automation stakes - speculation on my part, but there was probably a reason they got bought out instead of raking in the big bucks. Let's say they sold a few thousand units - do you really think it's worth keeping it running indefinitely? A lot of those people have probably moved on. I don't have hard data to back this up - but I have a growing suspicion most of the people shrilly screaming the loudest on HN don't actually even own a Revolv - the chances of them being one of those few thousand of couple is pretty small.

Karunamon 10y ago
>do you really think it's worth keeping it running indefinitely? At some point, I think it becomes less about "worth" and more about doing the right thing. Is it fair that everyone who bought that device is left holding a worthless chunk of plastic because of the inscrutable whims of various SV tech giants? If not for reams of legalese nobody reads and yet has to agree to in order to even hook the thing up, it would probably already be illegal in some way.
- SystemOut 10y ago
  Yeah, but normally when companies get bought for small amounts of money it's because they're running out of cash and would probably get shut down anyways. If they were making a profit they'd have been bought for more or they would have raised more cash if their business looked like it might be sustainable.
  - victorhooi 10y ago
    I agree with you - I have no inside knowledge of this, but all the evidence from the time points to not many Revolv units being shipped - I'd be surprised if there were more than several thousand units sold in total, over the lifespan of the company. They'd have no chance of ever recouping their investment, or gaining any kind of critical mass. An acquirhire was probaby a good thing, at that stage - the founders/employees get a new job, and the customer base get an extension on the shutdown, at least for a couple years.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- victorhooi 10y ago
  Your point about "doing the right thing" is a complete logical fallacy. Are you implying that group A is somehow more deserving that group B? Don't forget - the "tech giants" you refer to are comprised of people, most of whom have jobs and families This isn't about whims of tech giants - more about whims of the market. If the pitchfork-waving masses on HN screaming about Revolv had all actually, well, bought a Revolv, I suspect the company wouldn't have gone bust. The fact of the matter is - the market (or we) spoke - we didn't like Revolv, and that was the reason they failed in the marketplace. I don't think Nest made any secret of it - as soon as they bought out Revolv, they announced it quite publicly on their blog - we are stopping all sales of this product, immediately - but we will continue to support it for some time. This was no deep conspiracy - it was, well, the product's a wash, we're buying out the company, and keeping the team. Think about it - they probably still had stock of the product lying around at the time - they would rather just destroy those than sell them - what does that tell you about the product? http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/24/7061557/nest-acquires-rev.. http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/24/7061557/nest-acquires-rev.... http://www.cepro.com/article/theories_on_home_automation_hub.. http://www.cepro.com/article/theories_on_home_automation_hub.... There were heaps of pundits at the time who speculated on why Revolv failed. I think that's a far more worthy topic of discussion (i.e lessons learned on why it didn't gain traction), than going on about why we're not supporting a failed product from 2 years ago.
  - nitrogen 10y ago
    Charging money for hardware and then remotely disabling it sounds awfully similar to fraud.
    - timothya 10y ago
      They're giving full refunds to all their customers, so it's more like those customers got to use the device for "free" while it was available.
      - nitrogen 10y ago
        That is a different story. If only all vendors did the same.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
MaulingMonkey 10y ago
> Let's say they sold a few thousand units - do you really think it's worth keeping it running indefinitely? That's not the only option. Some alternatives would have been to make it not a SASS reliant brick. Or to open source enough that people could do that work themselves, at least in theory. Or to offer buybacks. I did read: > Nest is working with customers on a case-by-case basis on compensation, according Burnett. The company would not disclose exactly how Revolv users would be compensated or whether their Revolv devices could be replaced by Nest devices. ( Edit: http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/06/nest-to-disable-revolv-hub-mulls-paying-back-users.html http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/06/nest-to-disable-revolv-hub-mu... ) Any former Revolv users want to disclose how they did/didn't get screwed over, actually?
- timothya 10y ago
  It says on Revolv's website that they're giving full refunds to current customers: "If you're a current Revolv customer, please email us at help@revolv.com so we can help you out during this transition and provide you with a refund of the purchase price of your Revolv hub." - http://revolv.com/ http://revolv.com/

Karunamon 10y ago

>do you really think it's worth keeping it running indefinitely? At some point, I think it becomes less about "worth" and more about doing the right thing. Is it fair that everyone who bought that device is left holding a worthless chunk of plastic because of the inscrutable whims of various SV tech giants? If not for reams of legalese nobody reads and yet has to agree to in order to even hook the thing up, it would probably already be illegal in some way.

SystemOut 10y ago
Yeah, but normally when companies get bought for small amounts of money it's because they're running out of cash and would probably get shut down anyways. If they were making a profit they'd have been bought for more or they would have raised more cash if their business looked like it might be sustainable.
- victorhooi 10y ago
  I agree with you - I have no inside knowledge of this, but all the evidence from the time points to not many Revolv units being shipped - I'd be surprised if there were more than several thousand units sold in total, over the lifespan of the company. They'd have no chance of ever recouping their investment, or gaining any kind of critical mass. An acquirhire was probaby a good thing, at that stage - the founders/employees get a new job, and the customer base get an extension on the shutdown, at least for a couple years.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
victorhooi 10y ago
Your point about "doing the right thing" is a complete logical fallacy. Are you implying that group A is somehow more deserving that group B? Don't forget - the "tech giants" you refer to are comprised of people, most of whom have jobs and families This isn't about whims of tech giants - more about whims of the market. If the pitchfork-waving masses on HN screaming about Revolv had all actually, well, bought a Revolv, I suspect the company wouldn't have gone bust. The fact of the matter is - the market (or we) spoke - we didn't like Revolv, and that was the reason they failed in the marketplace. I don't think Nest made any secret of it - as soon as they bought out Revolv, they announced it quite publicly on their blog - we are stopping all sales of this product, immediately - but we will continue to support it for some time. This was no deep conspiracy - it was, well, the product's a wash, we're buying out the company, and keeping the team. Think about it - they probably still had stock of the product lying around at the time - they would rather just destroy those than sell them - what does that tell you about the product? http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/24/7061557/nest-acquires-rev.. http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/24/7061557/nest-acquires-rev.... http://www.cepro.com/article/theories_on_home_automation_hub.. http://www.cepro.com/article/theories_on_home_automation_hub.... There were heaps of pundits at the time who speculated on why Revolv failed. I think that's a far more worthy topic of discussion (i.e lessons learned on why it didn't gain traction), than going on about why we're not supporting a failed product from 2 years ago.
- nitrogen 10y ago
  Charging money for hardware and then remotely disabling it sounds awfully similar to fraud.
  - timothya 10y ago
    They're giving full refunds to all their customers, so it's more like those customers got to use the device for "free" while it was available.
    - nitrogen 10y ago
      That is a different story. If only all vendors did the same.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

MaulingMonkey 10y ago

> Let's say they sold a few thousand units - do you really think it's worth keeping it running indefinitely? That's not the only option. Some alternatives would have been to make it not a SASS reliant brick. Or to open source enough that people could do that work themselves, at least in theory. Or to offer buybacks. I did read: > Nest is working with customers on a case-by-case basis on compensation, according Burnett. The company would not disclose exactly how Revolv users would be compensated or whether their Revolv devices could be replaced by Nest devices. ( Edit: http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/06/nest-to-disable-revolv-hub-mulls-paying-back-users.html http://www.cnbc.com/2016/04/06/nest-to-disable-revolv-hub-mu... ) Any former Revolv users want to disclose how they did/didn't get screwed over, actually?

timothya 10y ago
It says on Revolv's website that they're giving full refunds to current customers: "If you're a current Revolv customer, please email us at help@revolv.com so we can help you out during this transition and provide you with a refund of the purchase price of your Revolv hub." - http://revolv.com/ http://revolv.com/