13 ms·

Anki Shutting Down

62 points by gonzalezcgg 7y ago

inetsee 7y ago
I was really concerned when I saw that headline. I thought that the Anki Spaced Repetition Software (SRS) website was shutting down (it's not). Those little robots are cute, but I think Anki is much more useful to me.
- hexo 7y ago
  Exactly, at least my web search wont get confused easily
- Stronico 7y ago
  I thought the same thing!
- StavrosK 7y ago
  Can we change it to say "Anki robotics"? I was similarly worried.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- cloakandswagger 7y ago
  It scared me too. I started learning Russian a few months ago and Anki (the flashcard software) has been invaluable.
themoonbus 7y ago
Employees "would be paid a week of severance" - I haven't gone through something like this, but that seems low. I know when the money runs out it runs out, but I hope employees weren't totally blindsided...
- mey 7y ago
  Having worked in early stage angel funded startups, I am impressed they are doing severance.
  - stingrae 7y ago
    This wasn't an early stage angel funded startup. They had 200m+ in funding.
- overcast 7y ago
  This is an unfortunate reminder to always have an emergency fund. If you're doing the paycheck to paycheck game, with one week severance, you're basically shit out of luck. Something eventually will come up.
- blueline 7y ago
  i was surprised too. i worked at an absolute clusterfuck of a startup that still had way more reasonable (8 weeks pay) severance package.
  - dwighttk 7y ago
    When the whole company shut down?
    - blueline 7y ago
      that's a good point, not an outright shutdown. i guess i'd wager that same company would have given 0 weeks if they were at the same point as anki
- bearmcbearsly 7y ago
  On the other hand, I don't think it's that uncommon for startup funding to come through at the last minute. I later found out that a company I worked for had come within 2 months of running out of cash before their next round of funding came through. I'm glad they didn't shut down at that point to pay a "proper" severance.
c3534l 7y ago
I was so upset that my favorite free flashcard program was shutting down.
jimiray 7y ago
My kids love the race tracks, Overdrive. I'll be looking to scoop up some stuff on clearance.
- chaostheory 7y ago
  Will it still work when the company shuts down?
- flossball 7y ago
  Honestly the toys they made are good, however they are all app/cloud connected. I hope the tracks keep working...
  - dawnerd 7y ago
    Makes me wonder how much of the logic was in the cars themselves. I'm guessing not much. Might be a fun weekend project to try to hack though
    - lsaferite 7y ago
      The car's on-board processor has enough logic to follow the track lines hidden under the track surface. The BTLE connection to the car is used to control speed, change lanes, and trigger lights. It also is used to 'drive' the car in some cases if needed.
- linsomniac 7y ago
  Interesting, our experience was exactly the opposite. I got the kids a set for Christmas (maybe 2016?), and I don't think we ever got it to do anything interesting. I could never tell if it was charging, phone, app, interference, or something else related. Maybe we just got a dud.
urda 7y ago
Didn't they just release a new device? This seems shocking.
wvenable 7y ago
Those of us who own their robots are currently looking for ways to save them. Yesterday, the Vector Robot SDK was updated with some of the changes they had planned to release in the future. The servers are still up; presumably so they can keep selling their existing stock for the conceivable future. But the full promise of functionality for Vector will never arrive.
- universenz 7y ago
  That's good to hear. I wonder what happens once the stock is all sold. Do you think they'll release the source?
  - wvenable 7y ago
    I think it's extremely unlikely; when has any of these companies ever released the source to their products? Also, from my experience, Anki was really good with the security behind Vector. He's so locked down that they'd have to officially release a firmware just to provide the functionality to load alternative firmwares or access other services. And with SSL you can't MTTM any of his connections. I just don't see them having the resources to do anything more useful at this point.
- dawnerd 7y ago
  I hope they open source some stuff too. I'd hate to not be able to use their little "slot cars" because the mobile app goes away. They're quite a bit of fun, but the price ruined it.
  - dawnerd 7y ago
    Actually kinda looks like it is semi-open source. https://github.com/anki/drive-sdk https://github.com/anki/drive-sdk https://github.com/jacopotagliabue/anki-drive-python-sdk https://github.com/jacopotagliabue/anki-drive-python-sdk
    - wvenable 7y ago
superqd 7y ago
Dang, I was looking forward to buying their new robot, Vector. We have a Cozmo, and my kids really enjoyed it.
chuckdries 7y ago
Honestly their toys always seemed really cool, but I'm surprised this didn't come sooner. They were _really_ expensive, which was justified by how advanced the tech was sure, but to a certain point most people just don't want to spend that much money on a toy
umeshunni 7y ago
> 200 million in funding > 100 million in sales Well, there's your problem right there. I have a feeling this was a company that would have done well if it had avoided the lure of VC funding, built its product and scaled slowly solving the interesting and challenging problems of building a home/play robot and getting consumers to like and want it, eventually selling to an Amazon or Google for a $100M+ exit. Instead, they tried to fund their way to become a robot unicorn and died an undercorn.
- jlarocco 7y ago
  Yeah, it's a shame tech entrepreneurs are so greedy. In most other fields $100 million in sales would (potentially) be a great business. Same sentiment with respect to getting acquired. Having 4 or 5 giant companies control everything is terrible for the long term health of the industry.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- craftinator 7y ago
  I disagree. Designing, testing, and building hardware is extremely expensive, and has a really long range return on investment; the fact that they coupled that with AI, also a long term ROI, means that they really needed a great deal of money at having a chance to succeed. I could see Cozmo as play to bring in a little more capital until they could finish creating industrial grade robots, but possibly too little too late. I'm not saying you need $200M to design/build hardware like this, but in this case it seems they may have expanded too quickly and didn't capture enough market share.
yitchelle 7y ago
Previous discussion on the same topic - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19782394 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19782394
universenz 7y ago
The build quality of their "toys" has always been extremely high perhaps to a fault. Think Apple-like materials, design and packaging. Sure, they weren't 'cheap' to purchase, but if you actually owned one of their toys, you didn't feel like you were overpaying. Both the children and adults who have interacted with Cozmo (in my case) have been genuinely captivated by the "Wall-E" like personality, and how fun their little desk companion toy can be. This is actually really sad news. With everyone being laid off, it doesn't look like there's going to be some sort of angel acquisition by Apple or something either. :(
coleca 7y ago
Such a shame. I've worked with a couple of Anki's former DevOps engineers (lucky to have been able to hired one) and they are top notch. My gut tells me that AI toys weren't the end game, since it's such a low margin space, but just a way to get there and they ran out of runway before they could reach that point.
msaharia 7y ago
My heart almost skipped a beat thinking it was Anki SRS. Infinitely more useful than another VC vaporware.
- lazyasciiart 7y ago
  Selling physical toys is about as far as you can get from "vaporware"
  - msaharia 7y ago
    $200 million funding and $100 million sales in a non-SAAS world (not profits) is vaporware in my book.
    - Oletros 7y ago
      How selling physical products is vaporware?
jackalo 7y ago
I wonder if they will release the full source code so that the developer communities around the world can start improving Vector's capabilities.
CamelCaseName 7y ago
Wow. This hits home for me. In 2017, I was reselling Anki Cozmos to help fund a side project I was working on. The buyers were consistently some of the most enthusiastic parents I had ever met. I had never heard a single piece of negativity towards Cozmo. My favorite memory was taking the train for 2 hours each way to visit someone's home and help them troubleshoot their Cozmo's problems. People here are claiming that Cozmo was too expensive, but I'd argue that Cozmo wasn't expensive enough. Interested parents will pay a lot for high quality and well designed educational toys for their children. I know this because I was reselling Cozmos for 50%+ more than their price tag. I had no idea of Anki's true ambitions in robotics and AI. I think it's that lack of focus that killed them. There is absolutely a market for well designed educational toys, but it's not a business that needs 9 figures in funding. I hope someone else will come in and take the lead, because this is a great niche, but one that doesn't necessarily need VC funding, just organic growth due to steady, incremental, product improvements.
xaedes 7y ago
So sad, just bought a Cozmo a few days ago and today it arrived. It is a great toy, I like it a lot already! What a shock to now see this in the news :(

62 points by gonzalezcgg 7y ago

I was really concerned when I saw that headline. I thought that the Anki Spaced Repetition Software (SRS) website was shutting down (it's not). Those little robots are cute, but I think Anki is much more useful to me.

hexo 7y ago
Exactly, at least my web search wont get confused easily
Stronico 7y ago
I thought the same thing!
StavrosK 7y ago
Can we change it to say "Anki robotics"? I was similarly worried.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
cloakandswagger 7y ago
It scared me too. I started learning Russian a few months ago and Anki (the flashcard software) has been invaluable.

themoonbus 7y ago

Employees "would be paid a week of severance" - I haven't gone through something like this, but that seems low. I know when the money runs out it runs out, but I hope employees weren't totally blindsided...

mey 7y ago
Having worked in early stage angel funded startups, I am impressed they are doing severance.
- stingrae 7y ago
  This wasn't an early stage angel funded startup. They had 200m+ in funding.
overcast 7y ago
This is an unfortunate reminder to always have an emergency fund. If you're doing the paycheck to paycheck game, with one week severance, you're basically shit out of luck. Something eventually will come up.
blueline 7y ago
i was surprised too. i worked at an absolute clusterfuck of a startup that still had way more reasonable (8 weeks pay) severance package.
- dwighttk 7y ago
  When the whole company shut down?
  - blueline 7y ago
    that's a good point, not an outright shutdown. i guess i'd wager that same company would have given 0 weeks if they were at the same point as anki
bearmcbearsly 7y ago
On the other hand, I don't think it's that uncommon for startup funding to come through at the last minute. I later found out that a company I worked for had come within 2 months of running out of cash before their next round of funding came through. I'm glad they didn't shut down at that point to pay a "proper" severance.

c3534l 7y ago

I was so upset that my favorite free flashcard program was shutting down.

jimiray 7y ago

My kids love the race tracks, Overdrive. I'll be looking to scoop up some stuff on clearance.

chaostheory 7y ago
Will it still work when the company shuts down?
flossball 7y ago
Honestly the toys they made are good, however they are all app/cloud connected. I hope the tracks keep working...
- dawnerd 7y ago
  Makes me wonder how much of the logic was in the cars themselves. I'm guessing not much. Might be a fun weekend project to try to hack though
  - lsaferite 7y ago
    The car's on-board processor has enough logic to follow the track lines hidden under the track surface. The BTLE connection to the car is used to control speed, change lanes, and trigger lights. It also is used to 'drive' the car in some cases if needed.
linsomniac 7y ago
Interesting, our experience was exactly the opposite. I got the kids a set for Christmas (maybe 2016?), and I don't think we ever got it to do anything interesting. I could never tell if it was charging, phone, app, interference, or something else related. Maybe we just got a dud.

urda 7y ago

Didn't they just release a new device? This seems shocking.

wvenable 7y ago

Those of us who own their robots are currently looking for ways to save them. Yesterday, the Vector Robot SDK was updated with some of the changes they had planned to release in the future. The servers are still up; presumably so they can keep selling their existing stock for the conceivable future. But the full promise of functionality for Vector will never arrive.

universenz 7y ago
That's good to hear. I wonder what happens once the stock is all sold. Do you think they'll release the source?
- wvenable 7y ago
  I think it's extremely unlikely; when has any of these companies ever released the source to their products? Also, from my experience, Anki was really good with the security behind Vector. He's so locked down that they'd have to officially release a firmware just to provide the functionality to load alternative firmwares or access other services. And with SSL you can't MTTM any of his connections. I just don't see them having the resources to do anything more useful at this point.
dawnerd 7y ago
I hope they open source some stuff too. I'd hate to not be able to use their little "slot cars" because the mobile app goes away. They're quite a bit of fun, but the price ruined it.
- dawnerd 7y ago
  Actually kinda looks like it is semi-open source. https://github.com/anki/drive-sdk https://github.com/anki/drive-sdk https://github.com/jacopotagliabue/anki-drive-python-sdk https://github.com/jacopotagliabue/anki-drive-python-sdk
  - wvenable 7y ago

superqd 7y ago

Dang, I was looking forward to buying their new robot, Vector. We have a Cozmo, and my kids really enjoyed it.

chuckdries 7y ago

Honestly their toys always seemed really cool, but I'm surprised this didn't come sooner. They were _really_ expensive, which was justified by how advanced the tech was sure, but to a certain point most people just don't want to spend that much money on a toy

umeshunni 7y ago

> 200 million in funding > 100 million in sales Well, there's your problem right there. I have a feeling this was a company that would have done well if it had avoided the lure of VC funding, built its product and scaled slowly solving the interesting and challenging problems of building a home/play robot and getting consumers to like and want it, eventually selling to an Amazon or Google for a $100M+ exit. Instead, they tried to fund their way to become a robot unicorn and died an undercorn.

jlarocco 7y ago
Yeah, it's a shame tech entrepreneurs are so greedy. In most other fields $100 million in sales would (potentially) be a great business. Same sentiment with respect to getting acquired. Having 4 or 5 giant companies control everything is terrible for the long term health of the industry.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
craftinator 7y ago
I disagree. Designing, testing, and building hardware is extremely expensive, and has a really long range return on investment; the fact that they coupled that with AI, also a long term ROI, means that they really needed a great deal of money at having a chance to succeed. I could see Cozmo as play to bring in a little more capital until they could finish creating industrial grade robots, but possibly too little too late. I'm not saying you need $200M to design/build hardware like this, but in this case it seems they may have expanded too quickly and didn't capture enough market share.

yitchelle 7y ago

Previous discussion on the same topic - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19782394 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19782394

universenz 7y ago

The build quality of their "toys" has always been extremely high perhaps to a fault. Think Apple-like materials, design and packaging. Sure, they weren't 'cheap' to purchase, but if you actually owned one of their toys, you didn't feel like you were overpaying. Both the children and adults who have interacted with Cozmo (in my case) have been genuinely captivated by the "Wall-E" like personality, and how fun their little desk companion toy can be. This is actually really sad news. With everyone being laid off, it doesn't look like there's going to be some sort of angel acquisition by Apple or something either. :(

coleca 7y ago

Such a shame. I've worked with a couple of Anki's former DevOps engineers (lucky to have been able to hired one) and they are top notch. My gut tells me that AI toys weren't the end game, since it's such a low margin space, but just a way to get there and they ran out of runway before they could reach that point.

msaharia 7y ago

My heart almost skipped a beat thinking it was Anki SRS. Infinitely more useful than another VC vaporware.

lazyasciiart 7y ago
Selling physical toys is about as far as you can get from "vaporware"
- msaharia 7y ago
  $200 million funding and $100 million sales in a non-SAAS world (not profits) is vaporware in my book.
  - Oletros 7y ago
    How selling physical products is vaporware?

jackalo 7y ago

I wonder if they will release the full source code so that the developer communities around the world can start improving Vector's capabilities.

CamelCaseName 7y ago

Wow. This hits home for me. In 2017, I was reselling Anki Cozmos to help fund a side project I was working on. The buyers were consistently some of the most enthusiastic parents I had ever met. I had never heard a single piece of negativity towards Cozmo. My favorite memory was taking the train for 2 hours each way to visit someone's home and help them troubleshoot their Cozmo's problems. People here are claiming that Cozmo was too expensive, but I'd argue that Cozmo wasn't expensive enough. Interested parents will pay a lot for high quality and well designed educational toys for their children. I know this because I was reselling Cozmos for 50%+ more than their price tag. I had no idea of Anki's true ambitions in robotics and AI. I think it's that lack of focus that killed them. There is absolutely a market for well designed educational toys, but it's not a business that needs 9 figures in funding. I hope someone else will come in and take the lead, because this is a great niche, but one that doesn't necessarily need VC funding, just organic growth due to steady, incremental, product improvements.

xaedes 7y ago

So sad, just bought a Cozmo a few days ago and today it arrived. It is a great toy, I like it a lot already! What a shock to now see this in the news :(