After just one phone, OSOM is shutting down

OSOM Privacy, the company formed by former employees of Essential Inc. is reportedly shutting down, and like Essential, it is doing so after launching just one phone. The decision to shutter the company was made on Tuesday following an executive meeting according to Android Authority.

Most of the employees at OSOM will be laid off tomorrow, Friday, with a small number staying back to work on a security update on the company's only smartphone, the Solana Saga. Those getting laid off have been informed they will receive severance.

OSOM's woes are reported to have begun when Solana allegedly decided not to partner with the company for a successor to the Solana Saga, a phone that was originally supposed to launch as the OSOM OV1. With its partner gone, OSOM tried to make a different product - an AI-powered camera. However, that seems to have failed. It has also been revealed that it was in talks to be acquired by HP, but that too didn't materialize.

With the shut down, it is presumed the company has run out of funds. Last week, a former employee filed a lawsuit against the company alleging that the company's finances were being used for personal use by the CEO, Jason Keats. A spokesperson for the company said they plan to challenge the ''outlandish allegations'' in court. But with the company folding up, it lends credence to the claims in the lawsuit.

OSOM was founded in 2020, and in its four years of existence, it only launched two products - the Solana Saga smartphone and the OSOM Privacy Cable (available on Amazon for $29.99). The Saga was supposed to launch as the OSOM OV1, a spiritual successor to the Essential Phone. It was first teased in 2021 with a planned release in the summer of 2022. Then it was announced in March 2022 that the phone would launch in the last quarter of 2022. In June of the same year, it announced the partnership with Solana and the name change. The phone didn't launch until May 2023, sporting web-3 features, a last-generation processor, and a $1,000 price tag.OSOM's number of products is less than that announced by Essential Inc. in its own short stint. Alongside the Essential Phone, the company also announced the Essential Audio Adapter and the Essential 360 Camera. Both the audio adapter and camera magnetically attach to two pins on the back of the phone.

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