Ahead of its upcoming IPO, several surprising (as well as exciting) details about Snap’s operations are coming to light. The one that is making headlines today would have to be the company’s once-known ambition of building their own camera drones. This means that a drone could have been Snapchat’s first-ever hardware product, oh-so intriguing!
This development has been reported by New York Times, citing three anonymous individuals who were briefed on this project. These people didn’t dispense any details but said that it was planned to bolster Snap’s plan of repositioning itself as a camera company. The report further reads,
A drone could help Snap’s users take overhead videos and photographs, and then feed that visual data to the company.
This is surely an interesting development and falls particularly in line with the company’s recent moves. Also, the timing for the rumor to bubble up and surface couldn’t be any better. Last year, ephemeral messaging app Snapchat changed avatars and repositioned itself as camera company called Snap Inc.
Thus, it ventured into the expansive world of hardware through the release of its $130 Spectacles. The said hardware product not only provided users with a new toy to enjoy and explore but also provided them with a completely new format of ‘circular’ video content to interact with. CEO Evan Spiegel positioned it as a toy to complement the Snapchat experience, but it has turned out to be more.
Thus, we can acknowledge that Snap Inc is definitely working on expanding its hardware division beyond the Spectacles. Though the latter may have been its first-ever fun product, the drone could be their second. The company could work on simplifying drone flight and amalgamate the experience in their popular messaging app. This would yet again make waves in the technology ecosystem, thus, giving it time to work on more meaningful innovations for healthcare and medical purposes, as stated earlier.
The piece states that the company once worked on drones, so there is no way of verifying if it still is. Also, details about the said project are very bleak, with the lack of some major details. So, we’d suggest you not to get super pumped over a Snapchat drone because it may never make its way to the market. But, we can hope to see the Spectacles go international in the coming weeks.
