Fitbit Reportedly Buying Pebble For $40 Million

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Fitness wearables and smartwatches share a lot of their use cases, to the point where one encompasses the other. Most smartwatches come with fitness tracking as one of their features, and a few fitness wearables also seek to integrate smart services into their functionality. The end result is that both of these categories end up competing for the same spot on your wrist, and some might not survive the competition.

You might have heard of Pebble before. Pebble is one of the most influential campaigns on Kickstarter, with the original Pebble campaign taking over $10 Million in funding for its $100,000 goal, the Pebble Time getting over $20 Million for its $500,000 goal, and the Pebble 2 campaign getting over $12 Million in funding for its $1 Million goal. With all of this money pouring in, one might get the impression that all was smooth sailing. But the picture was not as rosy, as Pebble had to lay off around 25% of its employees in March this year. The company also had to resort to debt funding and loans, according to Techcrunch.

Amidst all of these tough decisions, new reports coming in from The Information [subscription needed] and confirmed by Techcrunch, point that wearable giant Fitbit is nearing a deal to purchase Pebble. The Information mentions that the acquisition involves a “small amount”, but Techcrunch goes on to mention a sum between $34 and $40 Million for Pebble, “barely covering their debts”. The acquisition deal will see Pebble and its products closed down over time, with Fitbit acquiing the compny’s assets including intellectual property and software.

This deal is not the first one that Pebble received. Watch maker Citizen expressed interest in purchasing Pebble for $740 Million in 2015, while Intel made an offer of $70 Million before the launch of Pebble 2. Pebble’s CEO turned down both offers.

Spokesperson from Fitbit declined to comment on rumors and speculation, while Pebble is yet to respond to the request to comment from Techcrunch.

What are your thoughts on this acquisition deal? Let us know in the comments below!