GoPro explores sale after falling from $11 billion giant to $187 million company

[midian182]

In a nutshell: GoPro, a company so renowned for its action cameras that its name became a verb (GoPro-ing), is in trouble. The firm has lost a massive 98% of its value over the last decade and is now considering a sale.

According to Reuters, GoPro said it will review a range of strategic options that could include selling the company or merging with another business. The announcement sent shares up more than 27% in after-hours trading, though that rally says more about investor desperation than a sudden return to the glory days.

At the time of writing, GoPro shares are trading at around $1.10, giving the company a market cap of $187 million. That represents a remarkable collapse for a firm once valued at around $11 billion. But that was back when strapping one of its cameras to a helmet, bike, surfboard, dog, or anything else that moved was enough to make people feel like they were starring in their own extreme sports documentary.

From $85 to just over $1: GoPro's plummeting share price over the last 12 years

The review comes after GoPro received several unsolicited strategic inquiries. Those arrived shortly after the company hired consulting firm Oliver Wyman to look for new opportunities for its technology in the defense and aerospace markets, suggesting that GoPro knows the consumer action camera business alone is no longer enough.

The problem is that GoPro's latest financials make for some grim reading. In the first quarter, revenue fell 26% year-over-year to $99 million, while its adjusted loss widened to $0.35 per share from $0.12 a year earlier. Hardware sales have been under pressure for years, and even GoPro's push into subscriptions and services has not been enough to offset the losses.

The current situation is a long way from the company's 2014 IPO, back when GoPro was one of the hottest consumer tech brands in the world. But the intervening years have been packed with missteps.

There was the failed move into media, the disastrous Karma drone recall, inconsistent product launches, and the growing problem of smartphones getting much better at video while rivals such as DJI and Insta360 got much better at action cameras.

GoPro still has a recognizable brand, a large patent portfolio, manufacturing experience, and rugged imaging tech that could be useful outside the consumer market. The newly announced Mission 1 series of 8K rugged cameras also shows that the company is trying to move into more specialized products. Whether that is enough to tempt a buyer remains to be seen.

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GoPro explores sale after falling from $11 billion giant to $187 million company

 

[gdavid65]

Welcome to 3/4 of AI companies in 5 years time...

 

[yRaz]

Welcome to 3/4 of AI companies in 5 years time...

I can't wait for the nVidia bros to watch ASICs steal the market

 

[wiyosaya]

And so another fad goes the way of the dodo.

 

[ScottSoapbox]

Unsurprising. They had minimal hardware updates. Their dropping software support for last years model as soon as this years model came out was bonkers.

Anecdotally, I used to have 3 GoPros for my motorcycle racing videos and now I have 3 Insta360s.

 

[Axeia]

Never understood how they got as big as they did.
Could get 90% of what a GoPro did around the time of their peak popularity for much, much less. Oftentimes with significantly better image quality as well.

A lot of things seems to get popular to extreme levels thank to the herd mentality though. Once people see one thing take off the majority want the exact same thing instead of doing a little bit of research if they can't something better and/or cheaper.

 

[p51d007]

GoPro got big I think because of "social media".
Anyone that was hot in the social media game (youtube back then) was using a GoPro so everyone wanted to be on the "in" crowd and use a go pro.
Others found better less expensive alternatives that did THE SAME THING and before you know it,
along with poor quality control/support people have left them.
Today, GoPro is like Q-Tip, Kleenex, Windex...just a name regardless of who makes it.

 

[mbrowne5061]

Never understood how they got as big as they did.
Could get 90% of what a GoPro did around the time of their peak popularity for much, much less. Oftentimes with significantly better image quality as well.

A lot of things seems to get popular to extreme levels thank to the herd mentality though. Once people see one thing take off the majority want the exact same thing instead of doing a little bit of research if they can't something better and/or cheaper.

For two reasons: 1. they were "first", so they had brand recognition; 2. their first cameras were cheap enough and tough enough you'd be willing to hit one with a golf club just for the giggles of seeing the footage afterward and knowing there was a slightly better than 50/50 chance of the camera still being usable once you collected it.

They made semi-disposable, affordable cameras that gave you good images and videos, and you didn't mind too much if they got destroyed because they were cheap to replace.

Then they stopped being cheap, and the competition stopped having bad image quality. And its been downhill for them ever since. The poor software experience only added insult to injury. Looking at the history of their stock price, someone should have strapped some GoPros to their C-suite: that downhill footage would have been gnarly.