The Finnish company Nokia decided to sell the French startup Withings, which it acquired in 2016. Finns have long been going to get rid of the problematic asset. The news is that it will be bought by Eric Carrell, the co-founder of Withings.
Three engineers — Carrel, Cedric Hutchings, and Fred Potter — founded the Withings in 2008. In 2009, a startup launched the first of its kind smart Wi-Fi scales. This was followed by a smart tonometer, baby monitor, fitness trackers, arterial thermometer and Activité smart watches. The company regularly received prestigious awards for innovation and design of its products.
Nokia acquired Withings to expand its consumer electronics portfolio. The French company has become a full-fledged division of Nokia. The amount of the transaction amounted to 191 million dollars.
For the consumers themselves, the sale of the startup turned out that the products were first renamed - not the most serious problem, but sensitive. Then, due to the patent dispute between Nokia and Apple, Withings products disappeared from the Apple Store. For the same reason, in 2017, the planned exit of the Home Plus smart camera was canceled. In addition, the Withings app was renamed Nokia Health Mate and unsuccessfully redesigned. Users received new bugs instead of the usual functions.
In the spring of 2018, there was an unpleasant excesses: Nokia forcibly removed the measurement of the pulse wave in all scales Withings Body Cardio. Scales were sold as a wellness, not a medical device. Because of the measurement of PWV (pulse wave velocity), some regulators could calculate the scales with medical equipment, so Nokia simply “turned off” the problem.
The purchase of the Withings from the Finnish company itself brought only losses. In October 2017, Nokia wrote off $ 164 million spent on the deal. And last February, The Verge published a note for employees. The document said that Withings would never become a significant part of Nokia’s business.
Re-selling of the Withings is scheduled for the second quarter of 2018. Most likely, the final consumer expects a new round of product renaming. Withings is Nokia, Nokia is Withings again.
