We’re hearing from multiple sources that Cyanogen Inc. is in the midst of laying off a significant portion of its workforce around the world today. The layoffs most heavily impact the open source arm of the Android ROM-gone-startup, which may be eliminated entirely (not CyanogenMod itself, just the people at Cyanogen Inc. who work on the open source side).
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We have been told by several sources [ed. note: confirmed by Re/code] that the company plans to undergo some sort of major strategic shift, with one claiming that this involves a “pivot” to “apps.”
Quoting myself, early this year: “Don’t buy into Cyanogen. Just don’t.”
Cyanogen, Inc. has been misleading, grandiose, megalomaniac. I wish the people who got laid off all the best in the troubling weeks and months ahead, but I shed no tear for the megalomaniac, misleading, and arrogant way this company conducted its business.
I used a lot CyanogenMod back in my Galaxy Nexus days, but when they incorporated I thought Steve Kondik had completely lost perspective and was seduced by the flushing money venture capitalist offered to his team. I have nothing against selling software (I do it for a living), but you have to be clear from the beginning: if your plans are to become a commercial entity, you have to be clear how you are going to make money. If you start developing software as a sort of “rebellion” against the big companies and do it for free just for fun, you users will feel betrayed if then you change you idea and decide you want to make money from your “hobby”.
Moreover, they based their work on somebody else software (AOSP) and their plus was actually supporting newer versions of Android on handsets that were abandoned by their own manufacturers. The apps they developed for CyanogenMod were not exactly a must have (encrypted messaging ? their buggy music player ?? ) and when the ROM itself got too fat, I moved to something lighter. Most of the tweaks and customisation Cyanogen offered during the android 4.x days were then supported natively in android 5.0, and by the time I changed my phone to a Nexus 5 I stopped modding altogether.
I’m sorry for their employeee which are being let go in a harsh and coward way, but I did not believe for a single moment they might actually succeed in their ambitious master plan. Very little company shipped handset with Cyanogen ROM and the brand itself was actually “burnt” among users who might be interested. I hardly believe Cyanogen has ever been the selling factor for any phone offering it, not considering the fact that manufacturers supporting Cyanogen are not top players who can guarantee a decent numbers of sold handsets.
Edited 2016-07-23 09:39 UTC
I liked that the OnePlus One came with Cyanogenmod but it could have come with any AOSP based clean rom and I would have been as happy.
I like a stock rom and unlocked phone, not the Cyanogen name in particular.
Kirt McMaster, the CEO of Cyanogen Inc, thinks otherwise:
Such arrogance!
Ok, but in that case, I think he’s right. A good portion of the sales to US/Europe were based on it having cyanogenmod AND it being low priced/kind high speced.
Your issue is that they ever went commercial at all – this makes infinitely more sense than the OP’s constant contextless bitter rants on the subject. Thank you.
Edited 2016-07-23 17:19 UTC
“Cyanogen, Inc. has been misleading, grandiose, megalomaniac.”
My guess is a lack of revenue from a business model that didn’t have much in the way of sales lead Cyanogenmod to layoffs, rather than some estimation of their values…
In capitalism, you make profit or you die. Nothing about the summary’s little rant suggests how they might have alternatively made revenue, even with “better” open source values.
To be clear; none of this suggests I think they were a fantastic company run by fantastic people (or that I think it’s relevant), but I do think they were a business, and any business needs to sell something to receive a return greater than expense – a profit.
Edited 2016-07-23 17:16 UTC
The implication, correct in my estimation, is that cyanogenmod inc angered their potential customers with their misleading grandiose, megalomaniac behavior. I know they ticked me off. I swore off cynaogen phones and really the open source rom too.
Not really.. it looks like a small difference but it is a major one: you must not make losses.
A healthy company doesn’t need to make profits, it can survive for many, many years without doing so. If your company grows, do it slowly or very calculated. Use extra money to invest in a smart way, when making profit the money also goes to other people and constitutions. Stay away from stock exchange unless you know you can outlive crashes etc.
The ones that go to fast in their desire to be ‘big’, mostly do the same the other way round and don’t have the reserves or plans how to survive when that happens.
Two things. Companies need to make profits, even if they are “only” making “normal profits” in the economic sense. However, it is very difficult for a company to make exactly zero profit year in year out. So if a company is to survive, it need to make profits in the long term.
Secondly, stock markets don’t matter if a company is profitable. A company’s profitability is only correlated to its stock market performance. If you don’t need to raise funds to run your business, then stock market performance does not matter (to the extent that the CEO can keep their job with a tanking stock price).
But it seems Cyanogen Inc is trying to go for abnormal profits, which is what stinks for people.
Back in 2014, I don’t think Amazon took that advice. Seem to be turning a handy profit now though.
They have always had great revenues, but they used to spend as much as they could (or more – most high growth companies run a budget deficit, despite what right-wing politicians will tell you) to solidify their dominance in their market channels (online book sales, other online sales, and e-goods – Kindle books and apps, servers, AI increasingly, etc.).
Edited 2016-07-25 17:30 UTC
I’m talking about the whole system – and you do need profit. In fact, it’s best to seek a monopolistic position in the market. There is a competitive component to the system, if you don’t “win” enough, you’ll get out competed, and that means profit and growth.
You are right that some companies can and do last for a long time without wall street levels of profit (and without participating in stock market places), so it is possible – at least until someone with a ton of capital decides to do something hostile (see Hostess Brands for a recent example – or Nokia).
As far as stocks – those are just another product (a gambling unit that represents a share of potential future profit) that companies sell – complete with marketing and hype!
Edited 2016-07-25 17:33 UTC
They took the Microsoft Dollar. (embrace)
they are now on the Extinguish phase.
It is a shame that MS’s own mobile offering is a dead man walking.
Impressive. They even managed to skip the extend phase. Now they’re probably hoping for Microsoft to buy them.
No, this is another case of MS screwing up mobile efforts. Cyanogen is the extend phase. They would have hoped to distinguish Android, not Cyanogen. Cyanogen posed little if any threat to any Microsoft ambition. And MS screwed up the extend. 90’s Microsoft under gates would have used and abused cyanogen and actually crushed Andriod, by simultaneously making an inferior windows mobile and by using mafia like tactics to destroy all Andriod OEMs. This new gentler better coding Microsoft sucks at crushing foes.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not defending them at all, but the OS business is one that takes a lot of resources and money and doesn’t make a lot of revenue, especially when you’re trying to come to ab vendor android and iOS dominated arena.
While a lot of people wishing to keep their phones with the latest and greatest features of android while retaining them for a long term use their mods, I can’t see those same people paying for the OS since that’s why it would take for them to properly fund it.
Thom as been absolutely right with his suspicion all along. We will see if the mod gets affected due to this.
I might consider an android phone if :-
– I could get one that had a committment to supply updates on a regular basis
– Didn’t send every move I made to Google
– Didn’t have all the Crud that you get on phones these days, carrier or maker. If it has for example, Twitter and Facebook apps that I can’t remove then it is No Sale.
I tried CyanogenMod on my old HTC but it bricked it so I never bothered again but it would be nice to have the choice.
You must not be looking very hard… I own a Moto G 3rd Gen (pretty underpowered, but a great phone, nonetheless) and it has exactly the 3 properties you listed above. (1) I’m on Android 6.0; (2) Network traffic is minimal because I took the time to set it up; (3) and the only application preinstalled that is not included by Android proper (as in, the Android version on a Nexus) is Moto, an app by Motorola to help you migrate. Best part… it cost $200.
The second property/request is strange, however. If you don’t want you information sent to Google, who would you prefer, instead? In order to have an Android smartphone you need to be connected to the Play Store. You will generally be using Google Maps, even though other options are available from the store. Then you have GMail. Those are the 3 apps I use on a regular basis on my phone (I don’t like Hangouts and use the standard SMS app for that).
Cyanogen and Amazon are(were) the only non-Google OEM rom suppliers available in europe. Google can’t let Cyanogen collapse until the EU’s monopoly investigation is finalized.
Think of this in a similar way to when Microsoft saved Apple.
Cyanogen lives and dies by the popularity of CyanogenMod. OEMs are getting worse and worse at releasing their kernal sources (xiaomi!) which is crippling their ability to expand to the new devices. This coupled with the fact that ASOP is providing CyanogenMod’s key feature (clean android) I am not surprised that they are struggling
Like replacing Google Now with Cortana. Or puttig Microsoft ads in the OS. And I think they lost credibility with the exclusivity deal in India.
Agreed, pissing off a Chinese mega OEM is never good for business