Pebble

This afternoon Fitbit shared their financial earnings in a message that also tapped their upcoming smartwatch as a friendly beacon of light. This device has been long awaited - if you're the sort of person who loves the Fitbit brand and needs a smartwatch, that is to say - and until now Fitbit's provided scarce details on their eventual release. With the gravel of the Pebble community onboard, it's apparently almost time to make another stab at a wrist-based smart device.

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Pebble, the company, is dead but its smartwatches are still out there in the wild. People still hold on to the remnants of a once highly popular crowdfunded project. This creates a conundrum for those users, however. The smartwatch connects to remote Pebble servers for some functionality but Fitbit, who now owns Pebble's IP, has no plans on keeping those running indefinitely. Trying to do good by its loyal community who stuck with it through thick or thin, Pebble is pushing out an update that will put the smartwatches on life support when those server lights finally go dark.

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Despite the relatively more successful fitness tracker market, Fitbit, one of the biggest names in that area, is seeing some number problems. It has acquired Pebble, a darling of the smartwatch market, as well as Vector Watch, a move that is mostly seen as an act of desperation to remain in the game. Fitbit, however, was apparently not desperate enough to buy Pebble for its full selling price. Initially rumored to cost $40 million, Fitbit now reports that it bought the smartwatch maker for just $23 million.

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Fitbit’s acquisition of Pebble is undoubtedly one of the biggest news to rock the mobile tech community, and not in a good way. Considering how it unambiguously put a stop to Pebble’s hardware business, including the unfulfilled Pebble Time 2 Kickstarter, there has been no shortage of fear, uncertainty, and doubt (a.k.a., FUD) surrounding those smartwatches already out in the wild. Pebble has come out to officially clear the air somewhat. Bottom line: stay calm and keep on Pebbling. At least until the end of 2017.

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If there were a poster boy for smartwatches, it would probably be Pebble, in no small part thanks to its always successful Kickstarters, dirt cheap prices, and media hype. So when Fitbit practically killed off Pebble by buying it, it’s unsurprising that some would be led to ask if smartwatches, as a whole, are an endangered species. With Apple Watch sales doing “just OK”, and Android Wear devices descending into obsolescence, it is perhaps time to look back again to see why smartwatches have failed to become as widespread as our smartphones and perhaps come up with solutions on how they can still be saved. That is, if they’re worth saving at all.

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You don't have to be writing about the tech industry long to see a company go from bright and shiny startup to bankruptcy; Pebble lasted longer than many. Then again, the wearables firm was always being predicted for imminent death, even as it was raising millions of dollars in crowdfunding cash for the original Pebble back in 2012. "The Apple Watch will crush Pebble," we were told, even though Apple's wearable didn't break cover until more than two years later, and then take more than six months to make it to store shelves.

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Pebble watch owners go to the web to suss out the Fitbit Pebble acquisition, asking what's next for them, the users. What does this acquisition of Pebble mean for a Pebble Time 2 crowdfunder? How about someone who owns a Pebble Watch from a past generation? As it turns out, there's very little a person can do if they're caught between Pebble and a hard place.

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It looks like the rumors were true - Fitbit has closed a deal to purchase rival smartwatch maker Pebble. The buyout was confirmed by Pebble just a few minutes ago, and unfortunately, this acquisition means the end of the line for Pebble's products. Pebble will now cease making hardware, and all Pebble devices that were in development have been cancelled.

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We mentioned that Fitbit was reportedly close to buying some of the assets and people that were involved with Pebble early this month. Word has now surfaced that the financial woes at Pebble mean that the company is cancelling two of its products that lots of people backed on kickstarter. The Time 2 and Core devices have now been cancelled and sources say Pebble is planning to refund all Kickstarter backers.

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Perhaps in a year or two, maybe sooner, we will be looking at a time when there were nearly if not already a dozen or so brands competing in the fitness wearable market. As early as now, however, some of those have already been gobbled up by other companies. Fossil bought Misfit and Nokia, of all companies, bought Withings. And according to the quintessential people familiar with the matter, the next will be Fitbit buying Pebble. Yes, the household name in fitness trackers is eying Pebble, but not for its hardware, which Fitbit already has tons of, but for its IP, specifically Pebble OS.

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One thing you can say about Pebble is that it isn’t fazed, or perhaps even affected, by the global slump in smartwatch sales. As if to show signs of life and ongoing improvement, the smartwatch maker has just announced a major 4.3 update to the firmware and mobile apps, revolving around a theme of “built for speed”. Although there are probably under the hood speed improvements, it’s really more about getting to functionality and actions faster, with a new Kickstart watchface and support for voice reminders, on iOS only sadly.

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While smartwatches in general seem to be going through a lull, Pebble seems to be still going strong. After yet another phenomenal Kickstarter, the startup is now ready to share the fruits of that bountiful harvest to the world at large. Now that the Pebble 2 has started shipping to Kickstarter backers, Pebble is opening the doors to pre-orders for the more health-centric smartwatch. In addition to that, it is also announcing a totally new Pebble 2 SE that it claims goes beyond a “Standard Edition”.

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