Who Will Connect the Internet of Things to Business
June 23, 2016
Remember when Nest Labs had all the hype a few years ago? An article from BGR reminds us how the tides have turned: Even Google views its Nest acquisition as a disappointment. It was in 2014 that Google purchased Nest Labs for $3.2 billion. Their newly launched products, a wifi smoke alarm and thermostat, at the time seemed to the position the company for greater and greater success. This article offers a look at the current state:
“Two and a half years later and Nest is reportedly in shambles. Recently, there have been no shortage of reports suggesting that Nest CEO Tony Fadell is something of a tyrannical boss cut from the same cloth as Steve Jobs (at his worst). Additionally, the higher-ups at Google are reportedly disappointed that Nest hasn’t been able to churn out more hardware. Piling it on, Re/Code recently published a report indicating that Nest generated $340 million in revenue last year, a figure that Google found disappointing given how much it spent to acquire the company. And looking ahead, particulars from Google’s initial buyout deal with Nest suggest that the pressure for Nest to ramp up sales will only increase.”
Undoubtedly there are challenges when it comes to expectations about acquired companies’ performance. But when it comes to the nitty gritty details of the work happening in those acquisitions, aren’t managers supposed to solve problems, not simply agree the problem exists? How the success of “internet of things” companies will pan out seems to be predicated on their inherent interconnectedness — that seems to apply at both the levels of product and business.
Megan Feil, June 23, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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