10 biggest flops in technology in 2013

New Delhi: It is no surprise that new products come as a major gamble for technology companies. While Google succeeded with practically no flops, Apple came out well with just a few minor errors.India TV looks back at some of the biggest flops in consumer technology this year that didn't pan out as planned--or just flat out bombed.10. Yahoo's new logo With an aim to inject some fresh visual interest into the venerable tech brand, while keeping the familiar color and exclamation point, Yahoo unveiled its latest logo. It's been a big year or so for the logos of prominent tech companies. Motorola, eBay, and Microsoft have all introduced new looks during that time. It appears like CEO Mayer herself played a pivotal role, working with Yahoo's design team to design the new logo, but perhaps she should have stayed away. Interestingly, Mayer has gone into great detail on various decisions including font weight, an intentional lack of straight lines, and an attempt to preserve the feel of Yahoo's now former logo.9. Payments startup Clinkle Clinkle, a secretive, much-hyped payments startup, has planned to lay off some of its staff. This comes after a massive seed round of financing, releasing a pretentious, and vague promotional video. 8. Yahoo Mail redesign Marissa Mayer's tenure as CEO of Yahoo has benefited the company immensely in order to bring around the company's corporate culture, rejuvenate its products, and refresh its image. But a new redesign of Yahoomail and the long-running outage for some some Yahoo e-mail users is casting a dark shadow over a perceived turnaround at the once-mighty Internet player. Announced last December, the first e-mail overhaul rolled out to all users in June. The reception was lukewarm because it was just a cosmetic redesign.7. HTC One No doubt HTC One is one of the best phones available in market, but no one is buying it. The sales slump is causing them to consider scaling back production with speculation that work has been halted at one of its four main plants. However, the company denies the claims by saying, "HTC is not shutting down nor does it have plans to sell any of its factory assets. HTC has a very strong balance sheet and will provide the latest financials in our upcoming earnings call to investors and the broader community.” The One failed to turned things around. 6. The Surface RT Steve Ballmer was forced out of his CEO chair by Microsoft's board of directors, when the company took a $900 million write-off to account for an oversupply of the firm's struggling Surface RT tablet. While announcing the earnings for its fiscal Q4 2013, Microsoft showed a $900 million loss due to Surface RT "inventory adjustments," a charge that comes just a few days after the company officially cut Surface RT prices significantly. 5. BlackBerry 10 BlackBerry said it suffered $965 million net operating loss in the second quarter, following low interest in the Z10 smartphone. According to BlackBerry's results for the three months ended 31 August 2013, second quarter revenue stood at $1.6bn, down 49 percent from $3.1bn in the previous quarter and down 45 percent from $2.9bn a year ago. Of its $965m loss, $934 million was as a result of the "Z10 inventory charge", as the touchscreen device has failed to sell in the quantities that BlackBerry hoped.4. The Moto X The Motorola Moto X turned out to be a sales flop. According to market research firm Strategy Analytics, the Google subsidiary was only able to sell 500,000 units in the third quarter; it is being sold it since mid-August. The smartphone, available only in the U.S., was sold only for six weeks, but even then sales figures are disappointing. The market watchers said the price of the Moto X was too high.3. Facebook's Poke App Facebook launched its newest standalone app called “Poke” which lets people send photos, videos, pokes, or text Facebook messages to their friends that expire after a few seconds. Facebook thought it needed an expiring messages app because Snapchat's iOS and Android apps were gaining serious traction with young users. It was considered to be Facebook's top 10 biggest flops. 2. Samsung's Galaxy Gear BusinessKorea reports that Samsung has sold less than 50,000 Galaxy Gears so far, a very low number. Poor sales comes as a surprise because the company has poured a lot of money into an ad campaign designed to highlight its first-ever smartwatch.1. Facebook Home The HTC First, also known as the Facebook phone, was a disaster. The First actually had a lot going for it. It had the backing of Facebook, which invested a lot of money into the advertising campaign for the device. AT&T, meanwhile, had an exclusive deal to sell the device and promised to push it as a flagship device this season. (The story first appeared in Business Insider)

10 biggest flops in technology in 2013

New Delhi: It is no surprise that new products come as a major gamble for technology companies. While Google succeeded with practically no flops, Apple came out well with just a few minor errors.India TV

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