The company is still “number one,” said Elizabeth Parks, president of market research firm Parks Associates in Dallas. But it’s a shaky number one. Parks estimates that iRobot had nearly two-thirds of the robot vacuum market in 2018, but now holds only a 48 percent share. Meanwhile, rival robot makers like SharkNinja, Roborock, Eufy, and Ecovacs have been steadily chipping away.
One possible reason, according to Parks, is concern about data privacy. More advanced versions of the Roomba and other robots use visual sensors to generate detailed maps of the user’s home. This information is shared with the manufacturers to develop more advanced products, but it could also potentially be used to monitor users.
From the article, "IRobot faces a murky future amid rising Roomba competitors" by Hiawatha Bray
Amazon is estimated to be investing more than $3 billion in original content for shows like “The Man in the High Castle.” But even after it paid $970 million in 2014 to buy Twitch, a streaming video s...
Even if he is ultimately successful, O’Reilly probably will find that his podcast audience will be a fraction of the size of the crowd that faithfully tuned into “The O’Reilly Factor” on Fox News, whi...
The number of connected households that have smart thermostats more than doubled in the past two years, according to market research firm Parks Associates. With 36 percent of broadband-using household...
Twitter is looking for ways to grow its video services and garner more video advertising dollars. It sees live news as a natural focus. In an internal document obtained by Bloomberg last year, Twitter...
