Firefox OS is dead: Mozilla kills off open source IoT project with 50 layoffs

[pete_c]

Mozilla has shut down its connected devices group, marking the end of what remained of its Firefox OS platform for smartphones.

By Liam Tung | February 3, 2017 -- 11:11 GMT (03:11 PST) | Topic: Internet of Things

Mozilla has laid off the remaining 50 members of its connected devices team behind Firefox OS and other projects beyond the desktop browser.

"We have shifted our internal approach to the internet-of-things opportunity to step back from a focus on launching and scaling commercial products to one focused on research and advanced development, dissolving our connected devices initiative and incorporating our internet-of-things explorations into an increased focus on emerging technologies," Mozilla said in a statement to ZDNet sister site CNET.

Ari Jaaksi, the senior vice president in charge of connected devices, and Bertrand Neveux, director of the group's software, have also left.

Mozilla's connected devices team inherited Firefox OS technologies after Mozilla abandoned its bid to challenge Android with a platform for open web apps on low-end smartphones. Mozilla launched Firefox OS in 2013 and struck several device partnerships with carriers for emerging markets.

However, like Microsoft and BlackBerry, Firefox OS failed to woo enough users and developers from Android.

By December 2015, Mozilla had given up on its smartphone ambitions to focus on Firefox OS for Internet of Things devices, which produced a partnership with Panasonic for its 4K smart TV. However, last summer it handed off maintenance to commercial partners.

While some connected device projects will be shuttered, such as a crowdsourced platform to monitor air quality, others will continue with unspecified longer-term goals, according to CNET.

Ongoing projects include Vaani, a privacy-focused take on Amazon Alexa, and VoiceBank, a project to gather enough speech samples to support training of AI-powered voice recognition. Additionally, Mozilla's DeepSpeech AI continues under the emerging technologies group.

Despite Mozilla's struggles to move beyond the desktop browser, which is now overshadowed by Chrome, and low adoption of its mobile browser, the organization saw record revenues in 2015.

After ending its global search deal with Google in 2014 and striking regional partnerships with Yahoo, Yandex and Baidu for their respective home markets, Mozilla earned $421m in 2015.

As a non-profit, it's using those funds to campaign against numerous threats to the open internet outlined in its recent Internet Health Report, which covers issues ranging from market dominance by Apple, Amazon and Google, net neutrality, encryption, cyber attacks, and bad government policies.

 

[ano]

Mozilla has shut down its connected devices group, marking the end of what remained of its Firefox OS platform for smartphones.

By Liam Tung | February 3, 2017 -- 11:11 GMT (03:11 PST) | Topic: Internet of Things

Mozilla has laid off the remaining 50 members of its connected devices team behind Firefox OS and other projects beyond the desktop browser.

"We have shifted our internal approach to the internet-of-things opportunity to step back from a focus on launching and scaling commercial products to one focused on research and advanced development, dissolving our connected devices initiative and incorporating our internet-of-things explorations into an increased focus on emerging technologies," Mozilla

As a non-profit, it's using those funds to campaign against numerous threats to the open internet outlined in its recent Internet Health Report, which covers issues ranging from market dominance by Apple, Amazon and Google, net neutrality, encryption, cyber attacks, and bad government policies.

Pete, just wondering, have you tried the OS?  Was it a worthwhile cause?

 

[pete_c]

No.
 
No it was a worthless cause. (my opinion).....fox guarding the henhouse
 
Lots of that happening these days....

 

[BaduFamily]

No.
 
No it was a worthless cause. (my opinion).....fox guarding the henhouse
 
Lots of that happening these days....

 
Pete, how was it a 'fox guarding the henhouse?'

 

[pete_c]

It is hard these days to compete with the likes of Amazon, Google, Microsoft, ISP's, cellular providers, et al. 
 
Mozilla would have to join them.
 
The endeavor would have had to have been for profit and OS would have been tweaked for same said purpose.
 
Maybe would need a cellular provider that doesn't sink it's teeth to the OS and cellular transport or maybe using VPN or maybe Mozilla could become a non for profit cellular provider. 

 

[BaduFamily]

the Mozilla Corporation is a for-profit subsidiary of the non profit Mozilla Foundation, and has been for quite a while. 15 years? 18?
 
The OS was open, which had several goals.
 
The carriers were interested in a super-low cost phone OS somewhere between a burner and a smart phone and that is one of the places where the goals overlapped. ( I think this space is called feature phone? ) A lot of funding came from carriers looking for the ability to provide new-to-the-emerging-markets-old-for-the-first-world features.
 
As it got early carrier traction Google and then MS pivoted with super low cost licensing options. crunch.
 
Being open for examination also allowed the goal of allowing the open source crowd to review the stack for privacy concerns.

 

[pete_c]

The carriers were interested in a super-low cost phone OS somewhere between a burner and a smart phone and that is one of the places where the goals overlapped.
 
As it got early carrier traction Google and then MS pivoted with super low cost licensing options. crunch.
 
Understood and thank you BaduFamily for that explanation.

 

[BaduFamily]

One of the other goals for Mozilla was to replicate the amazing success of "View Source" in the browser, and to support a software development stack where an interested person / kid could just take a phone app and see how it worked... as in the early days of the web.
 
In many developing countries people use phones to create new markets for their goods ( mostly agricultural ) and to side-step locked down patterns of exchange. There were hopes that people would make their own solutions for their local problems and bootstrap a technical education along the way.
 
I was disappointed to see it roll up.