At one time iRobot was ahead of its time. Then time, and competition, caught up with iRobot. I am sure most of us remember some funny story related to an IRobot (IRBT) appliance - mine was the story I heard over the radio about a then-recent Roomba owner, explain how their living room became a disaster zone after a Roomba encountered pet poo during the vacuum process. The mental image was priceless.
If the Amazon deal had gone through, IRBT would likely have survived. But, as a standalone entity, … it was an uphill battle.
https://seekingalpha.com/news/4531439-from-amazon-buyout-offer-to-bankruptcy-irobot-gets-swept-away
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But is it the end of iRobot. They are being acquired by their contract manufacturer and will likely continue under new leadership.
This is mostly a restructuring. Investor lose their equity. Their lenders will probably recover something.
Competition is stiff. Their brand name is well known. We wish them well. (No, they did not get my investment money. Yes, I do own two of them.)
@pauleckler- You are correct. I should have been more specific - I mean, IRBT as a publicly traded entity. The contract manufacturer may/may not decide to keep iRobot as the brand name. At least in English, the name did symbolize the device’s action. Who knows if the contract manufacturer will see that - in particular, if their market changes
I understand their consumer product is best known but they also do institutional robots for military, police and fire etc. Those could be more customized and less competitive. Ideally more profitable.
Gonna guess the military is not going to be buying a lot of robots from a Chinese controlled firm.
Gee, if they are Chinese owned, why are they having trouble competing w imports?
So Chinese get well known brand name to promote and offer better more competitive products. And then there are tariffs to worry about. So import components and assemble in USA.