Will iRobot’s reinvention of the Roomba be on the expense of its historical past of innovation?

Once I noticed iRobot’s newest robotic vacuums introduced this week, my first thought was, “These don’t seem like Roombas; they seem like midrange fashions from Roborock, Ecovacs, and Dreame.” After all, as the unique robotic vacuum producer, iRobot’s merchandise seemingly impressed the design of most of its opponents. However Roombas have at all times had a uniqueness that units them aside from the group.

With these new fashions, the corporate is capitulating to the homogeneity of the present crop of vacuums, sacrificing lots of its signature options and transferring from high-end to middle-of-the-road in a quest to recapture a much bigger slice of the market.

Lengthy identified for its innovation in dwelling robotics, iRobot is advertising its new line as “breakthrough new merchandise.” However the one notable innovation I’ve seen to date is an onboard mud compacting bin. The remainder is essentially a reheat of each midrange robotic vacuum available on the market at the moment.

Then, a day after launching eight new robotic vacuums — the most important product launch in its historical past — iRobot warned that it was in such dire monetary straits that it may shut down in 12 months. Out of the blue, all of it turned clear.

They don’t seem like Roombas as a result of they aren’t the Roombas I do know and have advisable for years. Based on iRobot’s monetary experiences revealed this week, the corporate has fully restructured its provide chain in a bid for profitability. It’s moved manufacturing to a single producer, Shenzhen Picea Robotics, a Chinese language-based ODM that makes vacuums for numerous manufacturers, together with its personal, beneath the title 3irobotix. Primarily, iRobot is making solely new Roombas. However this shift isn’t about innovation — it’s about value reducing and survival.

iRobot CEO Gary Cohen says the brand new merchandise will increase income in comparison with its legacy merchandise. However, within the course of, they threat sacrificing the individuality that units Roombas aside.

As soon as a market chief, iRobot has struggled amid fierce competitors and a failed $1.7 billion Amazon acquisition. Final yr, regulators determined that an iRobot with Amazon’s energy behind it may change into the 800-pound gorilla within the room and scuppered the deal. This left the corporate with out its visionary CEO and cofounder Colin Angle, pressured to put off greater than half its employees, and with a mountain of debt.

In response, and primarily to outlive, the corporate is producing merchandise that seem like each different bot on the block and has adopted a number of new options discovered on these fashions. These embody lidar navigation, spinning mop pads, and white robots. (I can perceive the primary two, however don’t purchase a white robotic vacuum except you actually get pleasure from cleansing your robotic vacuum.)

Shoppers have been asking for these options for years, and an absence of them might have pushed many to go for considered one of its opponents over a Roomba — the corporate noticed a 44 p.c decline in income final quarter in comparison with the identical time the earlier yr. However within the course of, and primarily based on these latest bots, it seems prefer it’s deserted a lot of what makes it distinctive — its wonderful twin rubber curler brushes, well-developed and dependable vSLAM navigation, spectacular retractable mop system, and classy auto-empty docks.

I requested iRobot for a touch upon why the brand new Roombas so intently resemble the Chinese language competitors. It identified that iRobot set the design customary for shopper robots, so, in truth, it’s the competitors that’s been copying it.

“Different robotic vacuums and mopping options throughout the business have comparable design options to Roomba as a result of the opposite producers have but to develop a brand new, transformative kind issue,” Insun Hong, industrial design director at iRobot since 2021, mentioned in an e-mail. Whereas that will have been true 5 years in the past, most of Roomba’s new options existed on the competitors earlier than they got here to Roombas.

Including lidar and spinning mopping pads to Roombas might nicely make them extra fashionable, value iRobot much less, and make for wonderful robotic vacuums (one thing we gained’t know till we are able to check them). However I’m skeptical.

How typically has an organization fully retooled its merchandise to be considerably cheaper to develop and ended up with one thing significantly better? However that seems to be what iRobot is attempting to do right here.

The corporate’s annual report says its operational restructuring plan is “designed to extra intently align our value construction with near-term income expectations with the aim of improved profitability. Leveraging a brand new asset-light mannequin, we started to streamline our provide chain to set us up for velocity and scale whereas counting on our companions and contract producers to supply non-core engineering capabilities.”

The corporate says it plans to “proceed to spend money on software program intelligence, higher-value robotics, laptop imaginative and prescient, [and] machine studying.” However that’s going to be powerful to do with a vastly lowered workforce, a slashed R&D funds, and the offshoring of some engineering to “lower-cost areas.”

Software program is one space wherein iRobot has remained dominant. Its app has historically been clear, simple to make use of, and extra dependable than its opponents. Its AI-powered impediment detection is a frontrunner within the business, and it has developed a number of different machine studying applied sciences that make its robots higher cleaners, akin to Grime Detect, which acknowledges soiled areas and focuses extra time on them.

Hopefully, software program will stay iRobot’s sturdy go well with and be a solution to differentiate. It’s already added AI detection to considered one of its new fashions, which helps the robotic keep away from pet waste catastrophes and forestall it from aborting its mission since you left a sock in the lounge.

Together with the brand new merchandise, the corporate introduced a brand new app. Nonetheless, the brand new Roomba House app will solely work with its newest fashions; everybody else will proceed to make use of the iRobot app. It’s a worrying signal the corporate is leaving its legacy merchandise behind. (When it comes to growth, iRobot advised me it has no plans to cease supporting any of its present merchandise.)

Whereas this all could be the proper transfer for the corporate contemplating its present monetary state, I’m unhappy to see this shift away from what has made Roomba “Roomba.” That is the corporate that primarily invented the robotic vacuum greater than 20 years in the past — and invented the trendy self-emptying bin, the ground mopping robotic, and the concept of a robotic vacuum having a “mind.”

There’s little doubt iRobot made missteps through the years. It ought to have jumped on the two-in-one pattern sooner. It took too lengthy to develop a multifunction dock, and whereas an engineering marvel, its retractable mop answer doesn’t really mop your flooring very effectively. (However spinning mopping pads are additionally final yr’s factor; the brand new innovation is retractable curler mops.)

I don’t agree that iRobot ought to have switched to lidar sooner — its vSLAM navigation could also be slower, but it surely’s extra dependable. And I don’t suppose it did not innovate. I’m constructive there are prototypes in iRobot’s HQ in Bedford, Massachusetts, with retractable curler mops, extra superior camera-based navigation, and legs and arms to climb throughout your own home.

However the firm did transfer too slowly. It was overtaken on one facet by Chinese language corporations like Roborock, Dreame, and Ecovacs and their nonstop improvements and on the opposite facet by commodity no-name bots you should buy on Amazon for beneath $200.

There was a second a yr or so in the past when iRobot may have positioned itself because the high-end chief in sensible dwelling robotics home cleaners. It’s thrilling to suppose the place its innovation may have gone, with the ability of Amazon behind it. However dropping that deal and its visionary management left it adrift, and now it’s bouncing between its previous and its future, looking for the place it suits at the moment.