Cyanogen reportedly lays off 20 percent of its workforce, switching strategy to apps

It appears that Cyanogen's dream of taking Android away from Google may have shattered. According to reports Cyanogen is laying off some of its workforce around the world as part of restructuring. 

The reports states that Cyanogen has laid of 30 out of 136 employees, which is about 20 percent of its staff, and the majority of those layoffs have been in the team that works on open source ROM development. Along with  open source team, systems and QA teams in Palo Alto and Seattle had the majority of lay offs, but Cyanogen's offices in Lisbon and India have been entirely shut down.

The layoffs most heavily impact the open source arm of the Android ROM-gone-startup, which may be eliminated entirely (not CyanogenMod itself, just the people at Cyanogen Inc. who work on the open source side).

The report also claims that Cyanogen could switch its strategy away from OS development to focus on apps.

Another report from Recode states that the move was made by Lior Tal, who joined Cynaogen as its new COO in June. It further adds that several executives have also left Cyanogen in recent weeks, including long time product head Dave Herman.

Cyanogen's custom Android ROM was pitched as the best alternative to Google's Android OS, but results were mixed. The ROM made its debut on the flagship killer OnePlus One, but later the partnership fell through, when Cyanogen did an exclusive partnership with Micromax's sub-brand YU Televentures. However, YU has gone ahead an built its own ROM.

Cyanogen has yet to confirm these reports.

Via | Source 1 , 2

Kaiser Bey

Kaiser is a tech enthusiast who likes to write, read and talk about tech. He dreams of going to Mars and never come back. We hope that you find his posts on AndroGuider helpful and informative