Insteon Finally Comes Clean About its Sudden Smart Home Shutdown
upstart writes:
Insteon finally comes clean about its sudden smart home shutdown:
Smart home company Insteon and its parent company, Smartlabs Inc., suddenly disappeared last week. In what will probably be remembered as one of the most notorious smart home shutdowns ever, Insteon decided to turn off its cloud servers without giving customers any warning at all, surprise-bricking many smart home devices that relied on the Insteon cloud.
[...] Insteon has finally updated its website (archive here) and pinned a goodbye message to the top of every page a full week after its surprise liquidation. The statement-which is not attributed to anyone-says that the company is going out of business because of the pandemic and supply chain problems. The company looked for a buyer but couldn't find one.
The statement reads, in part:
In 2019, the onset of the global pandemic brought unforeseen disruption to the market, but the company continued to move forward. However, the subsequent (and enduring) disruption to the supply chain caused by the pandemic proved incredibly difficult and the company engaged in a sales process in November, 2021. The goal was to find a parent for the company and continue to invest in new products and the technology. The process resulted in several interested parties, and a sale was expected to be realized in the March timeframe. Unfortunately, that sale did not materialize. Consequently, the company was assigned to a financial services firm in March to optimize the assets of the company.
[...] Insteon ends its statement by saying, "We hope that the Insteon community understands the tireless efforts by all the employees to serve our customers, and [we] deeply apologize to the community."
Previous Story: Insteon Looks Dead-Just Like its Users' Smart Homes
Read more of this story at SoylentNews.