Issues proceed to look bleak for the unique robotic vacuum maker. iRobot’s third-quarter results, launched final week, present that income is down and “effectively beneath our inside expectations attributable to persevering with market headwinds, ongoing manufacturing delays, and unexpected transport disruptions,” mentioned Gary Cohen, iRobot CEO, in a press release.
This meant they needed to spend more money and at the moment are right down to below $25 million. “Right now, the Firm has no sources upon which it could possibly draw for extra capital,” mentioned Cohen.
The Roomba producer has been struggling for a number of years within the face of elevated competitors from Chinese language producers. A sale to Amazon in 2022 its lifeline; nonetheless, regulatory scrutiny scuppered the deal, and the corporate was left in further turmoil. It laid off over 30 p.c of its employees, misplaced its founder and CEO, Colin Angle, and was left with substantial debt on account of the fallout.
This 12 months, iRobot launched an entirely new line of robot vacuums, ostensibly to higher compete with firms like Roborock, Ecovacs, and Dreame, including lidar navigation to its line for the primary time (over VSLAM). The brand new fashions look significantly different from the original Roombas and extra like their rivals. In addition they use a special app with fewer options, however added some new {hardware} options the earlier fashions lacked, together with spinning mop pads and a roller mop.
No robotic?
In a regulatory filing earlier this month, the corporate warned it may be forced to seek bankruptcy protection following the breakdown of superior negotiations with a possible purchaser, and if it couldn’t safe further funding.
Roomba clients are understandably involved concerning the affect these present monetary troubles may need on their house cleansing robots.
The Verge reached out to iRobot to ask what would occur to the robots ought to the corporate exit of enterprise and obtained the next response from Michèle Szynal, senior director of company communications at iRobot:
“In keeping with our coverage, we don’t touch upon issues of this nature past our public disclosures. As disclosed in our Form 8-K filed with the SEC, now we have reached an settlement with our main lender to increase our covenant waiver below our mortgage settlement by means of December 1, 2025, in an effort to proceed our lively and ongoing assessment of strategic options, together with, however not restricted to, exploring a possible sale or strategic transaction and refinancing our debt. As we head into the vacation season, we stay targeted on executing our technique and delivering for our valued clients, companions, and shoppers.“
The corporate confirmed that day-to-day operations are persevering with as earlier than and there have been no modifications to any merchandise or help choices.
Earlier this month, fellow American robotic vacuum producer Neato, which shut down in 2023, pulled the plug on its cloud providers, leaving its robots unable to communicate with the Neato app. Nonetheless, the vacuums can nonetheless be managed manually.
Equally, if iRobot goes out of enterprise and its cloud shuts down, most Roombas ought to nonetheless proceed to work in offline mode — urgent the bodily button on the robotic to start out, cease, and dock it. Nonetheless, they probably wouldn’t be controllable through the app for options like scheduling or particular room cleansing, or through voice instructions. This potential dilemma simply additional highlights that cloud-connected units needs to be enhanced by connectivity, not reliant on it.
