Sonos is abandoning far-along plans to release a streaming video player this year. The news was announced by the company’s leadership during an all-hands call today. That product, codenamed Pinewood, was set to be Sonos’ next major hardware launch. It was already deep into development and has spent months in beta testing. But now the team behind it will be reassigned to other projects as interim CEO Tom Conrad reprioritizes the company’s future roadmap and continues what he hopes will be a turnaround from a bruising 2024. He told employees that a push into video from Sonos is off the table “for now.”
The abrupt cancellation of Pinewood leaves Sonos without a significant new product to ship in the second half of 2025. The company most recently released the Arc Ultra soundbar and Sub 4 at the end of last year. Internally, some employees were concerned that Pinewood would ultimately become a repeat of the Sonos Ace headphones and see the company trying to take on well-established players in a new product category. When it comes to streaming hardware, Roku, Amazon, Apple, and Google dominate the field.
Instead, at least for now, Sonos will continue its all-hands-on-deck effort to restore the performance and reputation of its software. “We don’t comment on our roadmap, but as has been previously announced we have a long-standing relationship with The Trade Desk and that relationship continues,” Sonos spokesperson Erin Pategas told me by email on Wednesday afternoon. The Trade Desk is the company behind the operating system that was to run on Pinewood.
Do you know what’s next from Sonos or other tech brands?
It couldn’t have been an easy decision for interim CEO Tom Conrad to axe a product that was nearly ready to ship. But it might prove to be the right one as Sonos refocuses on the basics and its core experience.
If you have any information on what’s coming down the pike at Sonos, or if you’ve noticed any perceivable differences at the company these days as compared to under Patrick Spence, you can reach me confidentially and securely via Signal at (845) 445-8455 or username chriswelch.01. This work is only possible thanks to trusted sources, and none of mine have ever been caught or disciplined.
Pinewood was designed to offer many of the same streaming video apps as other devices on the market along with deep universal search and content aggregation. But as I reported last month, Sonos also intended for it to double as an HDMI switcher and support passthrough functionality for gaming consoles, 4K Blu-ray players, and more. The box was also set to allow new configurations of surround sound systems using Sonos’ many speakers.
The streaming device was greenlit by former Sonos CEO Patrick Spence, who stepped down at the beginning of this year over the app debacle and its continued impact on the brand. It has also been described to me as a passion project of Nick Millington, the company’s chief innovation officer, who is currently overseeing the app’s recovery.
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