Is Go Pro the next Kodak? AI could bring down the action cam pioneer as filings raise ‘substantial doubt’ about its future | Tech Radar

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Is Go Pro the next Kodak? AI could bring down the action cam pioneer as filings raise ‘substantial doubt’ about its future

Go Pro invented the action camera, but now AI-driven costs are threatening the company's very existence

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On June 1, Go Pro filed a regulatory notice disclosing "substantial doubt about the company's ability to continue." The culprit? A deadly combination of increased competition, plummeting sales and soaring memory prices. It seems scarcely believable that the firm that essentially invented the action camera should be struggling, but there's been a long road to get to this point.

Go Pro's origin story is almost comically Californian. Founder Nick Woodman started the company in 2002 with a loan from his parents and a surfer's frustration at not being able to capture what he was doing out on the waves.

Woodman's first product was a wrist strap designed to hold a camera, but by 2004 he was selling his own branded cameras, designed specifically for action sports photography. In 2012, Go Pro accounted for more than a fifth of all digital camcorders sold in the US. A year later, Woodman would become a billionaire.

Go Pro founder and CEO Nick Woodman showing off the Go Pro Hero 2 camera in 2011. (Image credit: Go Pro)

Go Pro's 2014 IPO was the high watermark for the company. Go Pro wasn't just a camera maker by that point, but a full-on lifestyle brand. It had democratized the hero shot and put cinematic self-shot footage within reach of anyone who owned a surfboard, a mountain bike or a pair of skis.

Suddenly, problems arrived quickly and from multiple directions. In 2016, Go Pro launched its Karma drone to considerable fanfare, only to recall every single unit within weeks after some begun to lose power and drop out of the sky. The drone made a brief reappearance in 2017 before being quietly canned; margin pressures were cited, but the reality was that the China-based DJI already had the consumer drone market sewn up in a way that left almost no room for a late entrant.

Go Pro's ventures into virtual reality with the Omni and Fusion followed a similar faltering trajectory. Meanwhile, smartphone cameras were getting capable enough to satisfy the casual end of the market, while DJI and Insta 360 were building serious action camera competition at the top. Go Pro found itself squeezed from both sides.

Go Pro is back with its biggest action camera shake-up in 20 years

Cinematic teaser shows Go Pro is moving on from action cams, but to where?

My weekend with the Go Pro Mission 1 Pro: an action packed point-and shoot

A bold pivot toward a direct-to-consumer model and subscription service helped stabilize things for a while, with subscriber numbers growing sharply through 2020 and 2021. But revenue kept trending the wrong way, while the competitive pressure never let up.

The Go Pro Karma drone was a huge gamble for the company, and it didn't pay off.

The latest twist in this tale is that Go Pro's current crisis hasn't been caused by a rival outmaneuvering it or a botched product launch. Instead, the AI infrastructure boom has generated a voracious demand for memory chips at the datacenter level, pulling supply away from consumer electronics and sending prices soaring; memory reportedly more than doubled in cost in some cases during the first quarter of this year. Pair that with weaker sales through April and May, and the regulatory filing starts to make sense.

Go Pro was already running on thin margins, so these rising AI-driven costs come at a terrible time. The company's own warning states that without new financing or a strategic transaction, it may be required to "significantly reduce, restructure, or cease operations." No specific plans along those lines have been announced as the time of writing.

There's a cruel irony in the timing. Go Pro launched its Mission 1 range just weeks ago — a trio of cameras that represent a genuine step forward for the brand, with 8K capture, impressive stabilization, and enough versatility to appeal well beyond the traditional action camera crowd. We have an in-depth review on the way, but our early impressions suggest that the Mission 1 is a great piece of engineering, and that the company that still knows what it's doing when it comes to hardware design. The filing, however, shows that it may be running out of time to prove it.

The new Go Pro Mission 1 range is technically bold — but has it arrived too late to save the company's fortunes? (Image credit: Go Pro)

And if the worst happens and the brand does exit the market, there could be some major consequences for consumers. Go Pro is the Coca-Cola of action cameras: the brand that everyone reaches for first and the name that defines the category in mainstream consciousness. Rivals like Insta 360 and DJI make excellent products, and they'd continue to push each other forward without Go Pro around. But its loss would mean losing the market's default reference point, and losing the brand that competitors have spent years measuring themselves against. It's the sort of presence that doesn't get replaced easily, and its absence rarely works out in the consumer's favor.

Nothing is written in stone yet, and Go Pro may yet turn things around. But the notice feels like the sort of document that tends to mark a turning point, one way or another. We'll be keeping an eye on developments, and will bring you more news on what happens next for Go Pro.

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Sam has been writing about tech and digital culture for over 20 years, starting off in video games journalism before branching out into the wonderful worlds of consumer electronics, streaming entertainment and photography. Over the years he has written for Wired, Stuff, GQ, T3, Trusted Reviews and PC Zone, and now lives on the Kent coast in the UK – the ideal place for a camera reviewer to ply their trade.

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