Logitech Formally Exits OEM Mouse Market

Megalith

Megalith

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Logitech isn’t giving up on mice altogether, but they have decided to move all of their focus to premium retail products.

Logitech was among the first companies to mass-produce computer mice back in the eighties. For decades, its mice were supplied with PCs made by various manufacturers and for a long time Logitech’s brand was synonymous to pointing devices. In fact, Logitech’s U96 is among the world’s most famous optical mice since it was bundled with millions of PCs. However, a lot has changed for Logitech in recent years. As sales of desktop PCs began to stagnate in the mid-2000s and the competition intensified, OEM margins dropped sharply. At some point, OEM business ceased to make sense for Logitech: there was no growth and profitability was minimal.
 
That makes sense to me. Focus on your own more expensive stuff and let one of the other guys make the stuff that gets sold for a few cents to OEMs
 
I am sure their bean counters did the math, but historically, OEM contracts are butter on the bread. They provided the sort of steady income that makes stock holders happy. With the declining PC market, I suppose that has changed.

I use their Performance MX mouse myself, and will likely continue to buy it and the K800 keyboard for as long as they make them.
 
There is a downside.
While they were a major OEM, they could partially dictate the features available to these cheap devices.
If they no longer produce them, they could find other or new OEMs up the ante, providing competition for their retail sales.

ie as tech gets older, it becomes cheaper to produce and patents reduce in value/expire.
There is only so much you can do with a mouse for example, new ideas that boost sales dont come that often so the value of the high end products can be usurped by newer lower end products.
 
You have to figure that cellphones and tablets with touch screens are bearing an impact. My cellphone can do a ton and I almost don't need a computer for basic Web access/ email with my cellphone.
 
Brand protection for a future sell off. No more OEM contracts or obligations, so no complaints once sold. No more "cheap" products flying around with your logo on it. Only thing that remains is sales remain good or stable on their higher end products, then they just wait to be acquired by some big dog like lenovo. Once company is sold off, all the old investors employees jump ship or are laid off, new parent company downsizes the high end while shipping out cheap versions of their new acquisitions with all their products.
 
viscountalpha said:
You have to figure that cellphones and tablets with touch screens are bearing an impact. My cellphone can do a ton and I almost don't need a computer for basic Web access/ email with my cellphone.
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How the hell can you enjoy web browsing on a tiny little screen? It sucks IMO, I had an iPad mini and even that kind of sucked for web browsing.
 
mm my last logitech product stopped working with their universal drivers... I look down at my keyboard and mouse and shrug both are ms products and wired ones at that but they work I do not have dig a spare mouse or keyboard out of my closet like I used to do with my previous setups. I'd rather have working equipment than cool looking gear... though I have a heat warped razor that I need to replace at some point. You could make the keyboard flash to music when the screen saver was on and it was funny to see my system with the monitor asleep and key boarding playing along to inn godi divia or two minutes to midnight...
 
rezerekted said:
How the hell can you enjoy web browsing on a tiny little screen? It sucks IMO, I had an iPad mini and even that kind of sucked for web browsing.
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Enjoying it and that it works is two different things entirely. It does work well. I would always prefer an actual keyboard on my cellphones.
 
Well, my old eyes are not good enough for such small screens so will never use a smartphone as my web browser.
 
Good riddance. Their products are good, but the fact that they purposely try to obsolete them by removing features through driver updates is BS.

6 year old mouse that still works great? Too bad. 6 years is long enough. Time for you to buy a new one.
 
They would win if they came out with a decent trackball replacement. No one did it better than the Microsoft Trackball Explorer.
 
Wrecked Em said:
Good riddance. Their products are good, but the fact that they purposely try to obsolete them by removing features through driver updates is BS.

6 year old mouse that still works great? Too bad. 6 years is long enough. Time for you to buy a new one.
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Dude, PC years are different then regular years. You take a PC year and double, so your mouse is really 12 years old.
 
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