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Essential shutting down after not being able to finish Project GEM

By Cosmin Vasile

Published: Feb 12, 2020, 12:42 PM

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Essential shutting down after not being able to finish Project GEM

Four months ago Essential surprised us, and the world, with a brand-new device codenamed GEM. It was a very narrow-sized smartphone that was supposedly equipped with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 730 processor and should have run Android 10 at launch.

Unfortunately, it looks like Project GEM was too much for the US company. Essential announced today that it will cease operations and shut down the company. The reason behind the decision is explained in a short statement and refers to owners of the PH-1 smartphone:

In October, we introduced Project GEM, a new mobile experience that our hardware, software and cloud teams have been building and testing for the past few years. Our vision was to invent a mobile computing paradigm that more seamlessly integrated with people’s lifestyle needs. Despite our best efforts, we’ve now taken Gem as far as we can and regrettably have no clear path to deliver it to customers. Given this, we have made the difficult decision to cease operations and shutdown Essential.

If you own Essential's PH-1 smartphone, you'll probably be disappointed to hear that the security update released on February 3 will be the last one coming from the Essential software team. There will be no additional updates or customers supported available for PH-1 users going forward.

Also, Essential announced the Newton Mail users will continue to have access to the service until April 30, 2020. Essential's goodbye gift for PH-1 users is a prebuilt vendor image and everything else needed for tech-savvy to continue to hack the phone's software, which will be uploaded on the company's GitHub.

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Cosmin, a tech journalist with a career spanning over a decade, brought a wealth of experience to PhoneArena. His expertise lies in brands like Samsung and Nokia, and he has a keen interest in innovative technologies. After a brief stint in PR, Cosmin returned to tech journalism in 2016, committed to delivering clear and objective news. When he's not writing or appearing as a guest on TV and radio shows, Cosmin enjoys playing RPGs, watching Netflix, and nurturing his passion for history and travel.