Sonos CEO: ‘Stay tuned,’ newest product will launch in March

By Simon Cohen February 11, 2021

During the company’s 2021 Q1 earnings call with analysts, Sonos CEO, Patrick Spence revealed that the brand’s fans won’t have to wait much longer to see its next product.

“We are excited to introduce our newest product next month,” Spence said after touting the company’s impressive 15-year stretch of sustained revenue growth. “Stay tuned for details.”

Spence didn’t drop any hints as to what kind of product we can expect to see, but the most likely candidate at the moment is a smaller version of the Sonos Move, a portable rechargeable speaker that can work with other Sonos products over Wi-Fi, or on its own using Bluetooth.

A recently released set of documents from the FCC points to the possible existence of a Move Mini, which will have a more compact, cylindrical shape than the Move. The Move is an excellent wireless speaker, but its big size, big weight, and big price — $399 — keeps it from being a no-brainer recommendation for Sonos fans.

A similar fate befell Apple’s first smart speaker, the $349 HomePod. Apple eventually reduced the HomePod’s price, but also ended up producing the much more affordable $99 HomePod Mini.

Another possibility for the Sonos March product reveal is the company’s first set of wireless headphones. In 2020, the U.S. Patent Office published documents that show Sonos is at least contemplating the creation of a headphone product. Now that Apple has released its $549 AirPods Max, an expensive set of premium over-ear noise-canceling headphones that have been receiving generally very favorable reviews, Sonos might see this as the perfect environment into which it can release a competitive product at a similar price.

Whether March’s announcement is a Move Mini, a set of wireless headphones, or something else, Spence has promised that the company is going to stick to an aggressive product release schedule. “We remain committed to launching at least two new products per year and are well on track as we look at our fiscal 2021 product roadmap.”

Sonos’ most recent official announcement was the launch of Sonos Radio HD, a premium, paid tier of its Sonos Radio streaming music channels, offering ad-free, exclusive content and CD-quality streams.

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Sonos likely anticipated that some of its customers would be unhappy to hear that their older audio products would soon stop receiving software updates, but few could have predicted the massive social media outcry the announcement provoked. So in an effort to calm the outrage, Sonos CEO Patrick Spence has penned an open letter to customers, in hopes of clarifying the company's previous communication:
"We heard you. We did not get this right from the start. My apologies for that and I wanted to personally assure you of the path forward:
First, rest assured that come May, when we end new software updates for our legacy products, they will continue to work just as they do today. We are not bricking them, we are not forcing them into obsolescence, and we are not taking anything away. Many of you have invested heavily in your Sonos systems, and we intend to honor that investment for as long as possible. While legacy Sonos products won’t get new software features, we pledge to keep them updated with bug fixes and security patches for as long as possible. If we run into something core to the experience that can’t be addressed, we’ll work to offer an alternative solution and let you know about any changes you’ll see in your experience.
Secondly, we heard you on the issue of legacy products and modern products not being able to coexist in your home. We are working on a way to split your system so that modern products work together and get the latest features, while legacy products work together and remain in their current state. We’re finalizing details on this plan and will share more in the coming weeks.
While we have a lot of great products and features in the pipeline, we want our customers to upgrade to our latest and greatest products when they’re excited by what the new products offer, not because they feel forced to do so. That’s the intent of the trade-up program we launched for our loyal customers.
Thank you for being a Sonos customer. Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback. I hope that you’ll forgive our misstep, and let us earn back your trust. Without you, Sonos wouldn't exist and we’ll work harder than ever to earn your loyalty every single day.
If you have any further questions please don’t hesitate to contact us."
Though it's far from the reversal of the decision that many upset customers were likely hoping for, it is a reiteration of Sonos' commitment to preserving as much of its older products' functionality as possible, and for as long as possible.

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