No joy: Existing Pebble devices will no longer be updated as the company has dissolved.
By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla
It's a definite end of an era as Pebble has finally 'fessed up and confirmed it is joining Fitbit. In a celebratory letter to backers and fans today, Pebble stated,"due to various factors—Pebble is no longer able to operate as an independent entity. We have made the tough decision to shut down the company and no longer manufacture Pebble devices." Fitbit is said to have bought ailing Pebble for around US $40 million.
Exisiting Pebble watches will continue to work but no new features or functions will come to them as the company has abandoned working on these. Moreover, backers of the aborted Pebble Time 2 and Pebble Core devices (which broke records in Kickstarter), will supposedly be refunded. As Pebble explains,"Kickstarter backers who have not received their rewards will receive a full refund within 4-8 weeks as a chargeback to their credit cards. No further action is needed. For more information, please visit our Support page." According to Pebble, refunds for recently purchased Pebbles will be accepted.
Personally, I think Fitbit can benefit from what Pebble's engineers can bring and I hope to see some of that DNA transferred over to Fitbit. I'm also quite dissapointed that Pebble, who seems to have had a good chance to eke out a profitable future for itself, seems to have squandered opportunities at every turn. We won't know the real story but as a multiple-time backer and supporter of the ecosystem, some trust and goodwill has definitely been eroded. Right now, we need to observe and see if Pebble will comply in giving backers back their money.