The fallout from the release of the redesigned, bug-ridden Sonos app stretched from early May through the sweltering days of summer, as the company announced today (August 15) that it was laying off 100 employees.
News of the layoffs was first reported by The Verge, and confirmed by Tom's Guide.
In a statement to Tom's Guide, attributed to Sonos CEO Patrick Spence, the company said: “We have made the difficult decision to say goodbye to approximately 100 team members, or 6% of the company. This decision was difficult, but necessary, to ensure continued and meaningful investment in Sonos' product roadmap, while positioning Sonos for long-term success.”
“Our ongoing commitment to application recovery and customer satisfaction remains our top priority and we are confident that today’s actions will not impact our ability to deliver on that promise. Today, our focus is on our departing employees and ensuring they have the support they need,” Spence added.
Apparently, it is the marketing department that is bearing the brunt of the consequences of this reduction.
This is the second round of layoffs Sonos has seen in the past two years, as it cut 7% of its workforce in June 2023. At the time, it was reported that the layoffs were due to a significant drop in revenue and a decline in demand for Sonos speakers.
This summer was supposed to be a triumphant one for Sonos with the release of the aforementioned new app, the impressive new Ace headphones and even the powerful Roam 2 portable speaker.
Instead, Sonos outraged a fairly loyal community with its app redesign. The Sonos subreddit and the company's own forums and support pages were flooded with complaints and reports of a broken app, so much so that the company had to roll back a number of changes, including bringing back features that had been dropped in the redesign. It launched with no shortage of surprising features like sleep timers, alarms, and even playlist editing.
At the time, I found that my Android version of the app was extremely slow and sometimes wouldn't load or recognize speakers connected to the system. I will say that the app has improved for me, but that's not a universal truth.
Last month, CEO Patrick Spence apologized for the app's disastrous launch. “We built the new app to create a better experience, with the ability to drive more innovation in the future and with the understanding that it would improve over time. However, since launch, we have discovered a number of issues. Addressing these issues has delayed our previous plan to quickly integrate the missing features.”
He concluded his apology by saying: “We know we have work to do to regain your trust and we are working hard to do so.”
Sonos released a roadmap to fix the app last month, and it looks like the fix is on its way.
The app redesign fiasco was so bad that it delayed the launch of new Sonos products, including a potential successor to the Arc soundbar called Lasso. Spence admitted as much during a third-quarter earnings call, where he said fixing the app had become the company's top priority.
Meanwhile, the community is once again angry with several posts on the subreddit responding to today's news and calling Spence the one who should go.
“Patrick needs to go immediately, we don't need another RIM/Blackberry situation due to prolonged incompetence. He should have been escorted out this morning too (or better yet, in May),” Redditor _SB1_ said.
It looks like Sonos' summer woes will continue into the fall.