Jawbone, the company behind once popular fitness trackers, is liquidating its assets and shutting down, according to reports from Business Insider and The Information. The death of Jawbone is the latest in the wearable market thanks in large part to increased competition from Apple.
The company reportedly stopped producing its fitness trackers last year and stopped selling them in September of 2016. Jawbone sold remaining inventory to “a third-party reseller at a reduced price” to get a much-needed cash influx. It was reported over a year ago that Jawbone had stopped making its fitness trackers, though the company called those reports “unequivocally false” at the time.
Jawbone founder and CEO Hosain Rahman won’t exit the market entirely, however, instead launching a new company called Jawbone Health Hub that will focus on clinical medical softer and hardware. Rahman has reportedly already raised money for the new effort, through its unclear how much and at what valuation.
If that sounds familiar it’s because a report earlier this year claimed that Jawbone was shifting to a clinical-grade device. Today’s report from Business Insider, however, says that the company was struggling to get the device to work properly and that it’s unclear if Rahman’s new company will continue work on that specific device.
Jawbone Health Hub will reportedly service current Jawbone fitness trackers, meaning that devices currently in use won’t become obsolete despite the company’s shuttering.
Jawbone was once one of the most promising companies in the wearables market. It was at one point valued at about $3 billion, raising somewhere around $1 billion over the years. Last year, Pebble also threw in the towel, selling itself to Fitbit for somewhere around $40 million.
With Apple Watch, Apple has overtaken Fitbit to become the world’s top wearables vendor, holding somewhere around 16 percent of the market. Apple is followed closely by Xiaomi. Not a whole lot is known about Jawbone Health Hub at this point, but we’ll be sure to keep you posted if anything notable comes out of the company.
