That in turn suggests that the stand-alone movie camera business is effectively dead, killed off by smartphones capable of shooting high-definition video which have seen explosive sales in the past 18 months – precisely the period since Cisco bought Flip.
Profits or losses for the division were not disclosed.Ī spokeswoman for Cisco would not say whether the company had tried to sell the Flip business, but the fact of the closure suggests it was impossible to find a trade buyer. Though Cisco never broke out revenues from the Flip division, they are believed to be small: its latest accounts show that "other products" – understood to include its Linksys routers and Flip cameras – generated revenues of just $211m in the most recent quarter, down from $229m the previous quarter. The shutdown, announced on Tuesday afternoon as part of a widespread reorganisation as the company attempts to rejig its business, will see Cisco reorganise its remaining consumer businesses to support its existing "key priorities" – notably the routers and switches that generate the majority of its sales. The move will mean the loss of 550 jobs worldwide, cost Cisco $300m – and disappoint thousands of users who had enjoyed the devices' simplicity. The networking and router company Cisco is shutting down the consumer-oriented Flip camera business that it bought for $590m in 2009.