Management

GoPro, Inc.: Will Entry into the Drone Market Help its Comeback?

Case

Author: Niccolò Pisani & Petra van den Dolder

Online Pub Date: January 02, 2018 | Original Pub. Date: 2018

Subject: Business & Management, Strategic Management & Business Policy

Level: Intermediate | Type: Indirect case | Length: 4820 words

Copyright: © Niccolò Pisani and Petra van den Dolder 2018

Organization: GoPro, Inc. | Organization size: Large

Region: United States of America | State:

Industry: Manufacture of computer, electronic and optical products

Originally Published in:

Publisher: SAGE Publications: SAGE Business Cases Originals

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781526445902 | Online ISBN: 9781526445902

© Niccolò Pisani and Petra van den Dolder 2018

This case was prepared for inclusion in SAGE Business Cases primarily as a basis for classroom discussion or self-study, and is not meant to illustrate either effective or ineffective management styles. Nothing herein shall be deemed to be an endorsement of any kind. This case is for scholarly, educational, or personal use only within your university, and cannot be forwarded outside the university or used for other commercial purposes. 2018 SAGE Publications Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

This content may only be distributed for use within University of Florida. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781526445902

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Abstract

Although GoPro has experienced tremendous growth since its foundation, investors have started to lose faith in the ability of the firm to continue on its success path. On March 14, 2017 the stock price reached an all-time low of $7.24 and has been trading below $10.00 ever since, thus considerably below the initial IPO price of $24.00 set in June 2014. This case describes how GoPro has rapidly grown to be a billion-dollar company and elaborates on the several challenges it has been facing in the recent past. Particularly, the competition in the action camera market has become very fierce. For example, the Chinese producer Xiaomi, which has launched products that are technologically advanced while priced very aggressively, has seen increased market share. At the time of the case, in June 2017, GoPro has just completed its entry into the drone market with the introduction of its model Karma. Despite the strong competitive pressures that characterize the drone market—with the Chinese manufacturer DJI holding approximately 70% of the worldwide market share—GoPro hopes this move will help its comeback. The case invites students to put themselves in the shoes of a business consultant who has been hired by GoPro to evaluate its entry into the drone market and provide recommendations to the top management team on how to win the competitive battle and become profitable again.

Case

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this case study, students should have an improved understanding of the following:

What the advantages and disadvantages are of being the first versus late mover in a given market What the impact of the time of market entry is, especially in high-technology environments How increased competition from emerging countries has changed the international competitive landscape for high-technology firms based in developed countries

GoPro, Inc.: Will Entry into the Drone Market Help its Comeback?

By the beginning of 2017, GoPro had achieved a global reach of more than 45,000 retail outlets and sold products in more than 100 countries through direct and indirect sales channels (GoPro Inc, 2016). The company has experienced tremendous growth ever since its foundation in 2002. By tapping into an unserved market niche, GoPro has rapidly grown from a “one-man start-up” to a billion dollar company, with a brand name that has rapidly turned into a synonym for action cameras. Despite the terrific success story characterizing its early years, in the very recent past GoPro has faced important challenges that have led investors to question whether the firm will be able to continue on its success path moving forward. The stock price of GoPro has been falling since mid-2015 and on March 14, 2017 it reached an all- time low of $7.24, considerably below the initial IPO price set in June 2014 ($24.00). One of the reasons for this significant drop are the production issues the company has been facing with the launch of its newest action camera, the HERO5 (Vanian, 2017). Partly because of these problems, GoPro sales were lower than expected, resulting in a negative net income of

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$419 million in fiscal year 2016 (GoPro Inc, 2016). At the time of the case, in June 2017, GoPro has just completed its entry into the drone market with the introduction of its model Karma, whose launch has also been affected by production issues (Vanian, 2017). Despite the production problems associated with the launch of its new products and the fierce competition from international players such as Chinese manufacturers Xiaomi and DJI in both action camera and drone markets, GoPro hopes that entry into the drone market will help its comeback. However, investors are still wondering whether GoPro will be able to bounce back to its success path in view of the many challenges faced.

History and Growth of GoPro

Nicholas Woodman, son of a successful investment banker, grew up in a prosperous suburb of Atherton, California, in the heart of Silicon Valley (Brett, 2015). Obsessed by ocean waves since the age of eight, he decided to attend the University of California in San Diego as it is located near the sea. His parents were not very supportive of his decision, but as Nicholas said: “If I didn’t follow my passion for surfing … I would have never come up with the concept to make a wrist camera” (Mac, 2013a). Before starting GoPro, Woodman first had a go at two start-ups. The first one was a website called EmpowerAll.com through which he attempted to sell electronic goods with incredibly small margins. But it failed to get off the ground. The other start-up was Funbug.com, a gaming and marketing platform. Unfortunately, the company went out of business because of the 2000/01 “dot com” crash, taking with it the $3.9 million Woodman raised from investors (Mac, 2013c). To clear his head, the young entrepreneur went on a surfing trip to Indonesia and Australia. It was during this trip that Woodman came up with the idea of the action camera, resulting in the foundation of GoPro.

In October 2002, tired of losing other people’s money, Woodman used $30,000 of his own money, a $200,000 investment by his father, and $35,000 from his mother to found Woodman Labs, which was later renamed GoPro (Mac, 2013b; Shontell, 2014). Two years later, in 2004, the first camera known as the 35mm HERO was sold at an action sports trade show in San Diego (Brett, 2015; Mac, 2013a). The HERO used 35mm film and was waterproof, making it ideal for capturing images while surfing (Pavle, 2016). It featured a strap allowing users to strap the camera to their arm and simply unclip it, take pictures, and clip it back into place after the usage. It was lightweight and offered unprecedented possibilities at the time, allowing Woodman to create a new niche market for his revolutionary product.

Only one year later, GoPro sales hit $350,000 by selling to specialty sport boutiques and surf shops, next to appearing at QVC three times to reach a broader audience (Mac, 2013a, 2013c; Shontell, 2014). In 2006 GoPro made the transition to digital cameras by introducing the Digital HERO camera that was able to shoot 10 seconds of VGA video without sound (Mac, 2013c). The new model, the Digital HERO3, improved the previous one by offering unlimited video capacity and sound. This product was launched in the spring of 2007, only six months after Google bought the then small company YouTube. Partly thanks to the popularity of YouTube, sales of GoPro tripled that year and have continued at a similar pace in the years thereafter, as the camera offered by GoPro provided an ideal tool to record action videos that could then be easily posted on YouTube (Moritz, 2012). Another part of the success of GoPro was the broadening of the target group. GoPro, initially designed for surfers, realized that its camera could also be used for other action sports. Therefore, GoPro launched different mounts; this way users were able to also attach their GoPro to ski poles, car frames, helmets, skateboards, and the like. Furthermore, by introducing a wide-angle lens, users could also capture themselves while in action. In 2010 the sales of GoPro increased significantly due in part to the introduction of the HERO HD; revenues reached $64 million by the end of the year

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(Mac, 2013c).

In May 2011, GoPro received funding from five venture capital firms, including Riverwood Capital, Steamboat Ventures, and the venture investment arm of Disney (Mac, 2013c). The total investment amounted to $88 million. The next year, Chinese electronics manufacturer Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., also known as Foxconn, made a $200 million investment in GoPro, thereby attaining an 8.88% stake in the firm (Mac, 2012). With this investment, GoPro was valued at $2.25 billion. These events made GoPro ready for their initial public offering (IPO), which took place on June 26, 2014 with an initial stock price of $24.00. GoPro reached a market capitalization of almost $4 billion, ending the day with a stock price of $31.34 (Lorenzetti, 2014). At the beginning of 2017 GoPro had grown to a company with 1,552 employees (GoPro Inc, 2016).

The GoPro Value Chain

Since the prototyping stage of the first GoPro product, Nicholas Woodman has outsourced the manufacturing of the camera to a company in Shenzhen, China (Mac, 2013a). This way the company could stay flexible, while enjoying the location-specific advantage of the lower manufacturing costs characterizing the Chinese site. Some of the design and development activities are performed in China, while the other activities are carried out in California, Switzerland, and France. Furthermore, the company has contracts with third-party fulfillment centers in almost every continent; locations of these fulfillment centers are in California, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Brazil, and the Netherlands. These facilities are either a fulfillment and warehouse center or full service distribution center, which also perform light assembly. In addition, GoPro also has third-party packaging centers in California, Czech Republic, and China (GoPro Inc, 2016).

In February 2017, GoPro announced that they were going to open a research and development center in Bucharest, Romania, to develop software (Grigonis, 2017). As the chief operating officer CJ Prober said: “The area is rich with diverse talent from prestigious colleges and universities, as well as Fortune 500 technology companies. We have the opportunity to leverage this talent and consolidate our outsourced software and IT contractors into one centrally located, highly efficient team” (Grigonis, 2017). GoPro established its software by buying out several smaller companies (such as Stupeflix and Vemory), rebranding them and using their Quik mobile app for automatic video edits and Slice for custom edits. Furthermore, GoPro acquired Kolor to develop the technology for virtual reality (VR) viewers (Grigonis, 2017). To remain at the innovation frontier, GoPro research and development expenditures have rapidly increased from $70.63 million in 2013 to $295.90 in 2016. As a result of this, the ratio of R&D expenditures to total revenues has climbed from 7.5 percent in 2013 to 30.3 percent in 2016 (GoPro Inc, 2015, 2016).

Competition

The action camera market has witnessed increasing competition during the last few years. While GoPro has essentially created the action camera market with its first revolutionary product, it now faces stiff competition from companies such as Sony, Garmin, and iOn, but also from several emerging competitors such as Polaroid, LG, TomTom, Olympus, and the Chinese manufacturing giant Xiaomi (Beige Market Intelligence, 2016). Some of these competitors offer products that are comparable to the ones manufactured by GoPro in terms of quality and features while being priced very aggressively. Whereas it can be argued that

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GoPro remains a premium brand in the market space, one of the biggest challenges for GoPro is the lack of competitive barriers in the action camera market that has allowed these new entrants to gain market shares in a market that was initially dominated almost exclusively by GoPro (Sun, 2014). Sony, for example, has become a real threat for GoPro, releasing technologically advanced devices that are very lightweight and feature Zeiss-Tessar lenses that maximize light for better quality low-light recording (Tech Stock Insider, 2016). Xiaomi, well-known for dominating the Chinese smartphone market, is another major competitor that GoPro is currently facing. Xiaomi launched its Yi Action Camera in 2015, selling for as little as $65, whereas the GoPro product, HERO, was priced at $130 (Kleinman, 2015). Yi Action Camera was equipped with a 16-megapixel lens, shooting full HD video at 60 frames per second and features a powerful Sony image sensor. Just as with the GoPro product, it also worked underwater and featured a durable plastic design. Xiaomi also launched a 4K version of its Yi Camera for $249.99 in 2016 (Brokaw, 2016). It rivaled the GoPro high-end HERO4 Silver and Black editions, priced at $399.99 and $499.99, respectively. To further illustrate the price war, GoPro has had to contend with the last few years, its HERO4 model had to undergo two serious price cuts of both $100 before its sales figures rose (Burlacu, 2015; Wang, 2016a).

On the software side, Xiaomi also developed a mobile app for taking control of the camera, thus competing not just on hardware but also on development of innovative software (Kleinman, 2015). Furthermore, GoPro has been challenged by newcomers introducing products with features that the GoPro cameras do not yet feature; for instance, the LG cameras and their built-in LTE connectivity (Tech Stock Insider, 2016). This allows LG cameras to stream live to YouTube and other popular sites.

In addition to the threat of direct competitors in the action camera market, GoPro has also faced increased competition as a result of the increasing quality of cameras installed on mobile phones. As Woodman himself said: “We failed to make GoPro contemporary and failed to align GoPro to the smartphone movement” and “the smartphone has set a new bar for convenience” (Oyedele, 2017). This might especially be true when trying to tap into the selfie market. With the quality of photography of smartphone cameras rapidly improving, it is difficult to ask for customers that already have a smartphone to buy an additional camera. This is especially the case when considering the GoPro flagship device, the HERO5, which costs $399.99, with the lower end of the market getting crowded with low-priced offerings from competitors (Oyedele, 2017). Having said that, the threat of substitution with smartphone cameras does not seem to be imminent for the originally targeted group of action sports fanatics. Many people would in fact never like to risk their phone when, for example, skydiving. Moreover, the GoPro cameras continue to have a better ease-of-use vis-à-vis mobile phones when participating in action sports, especially when considering the specific supports that can be mounted.

Lastly, in light of the latest technological developments that turned VR into the newest trend for action cameras, GoPro also launched two VR camera solutions, namely the Odyssey ($15,000) and the Omni ($5,000) (Hoium, 2017). These cameras are premium-priced solutions featuring multiple HERO cameras to capture 360 degrees videos. However, competitors are not lagging behind and have also released similar products at much lower prices. Samsung Gear 360 VR is priced at $361 and the LG 360 Cam at $199. The GoPro solution may well be more advanced technologically, but the enormous price difference poses some problems for the marketability of these products (Hoium, 2017).

Drone Market

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In 2014, GoPro decided to diversify and began developing its own line of drones for consumers. Drones, also called unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), have existed for more than a century and were originally developed for military purposes. The military market has been the driver for the development of the drone technology. Over time, manufacturers have produced increasingly cheaper, lighter, and more sophisticated commercial drones. As a result of these developments, drones have also been used in other contexts beyond the military one, such as in agriculture, media, mining, and law enforcement. As the potential uses for drones increased for consumers as well, the drone market for consumers increased markedly after 2010 (Center for a New American Security, n.d.). The drones for consumer usage are usually of the quadcopter type, featuring four rotors for vertical lift.

Between 2011 and 2013, DJI, the largest manufacturer of consumer drones in the world, saw their annual revenue increasing by almost 3,000 percent and the market has been expanding ever since. The commercial market for drones was already estimated at $2 billion in 2016, with growth expected to boom by more than 6,000 percent in the next few years, generating an expected market size of $127 billion by 2020 (Moskwa, 2016; Tractica, 2015). The falling costs of drones make them more suitable for everyday applications. Thus, it is not a surprise that big investments in this market have been made. In 2015, DJI invested $75 million, followed by the $64 million invested by 3D Robotics (whose main investors are Qualcomm Ventures and WestSummit Capital) and the $60 million by Yuneec (whose main investor is Intel).

Even though the drone market is already competitive, with DJI having a 70% share of the market, GoPro still decided to invest in this market, seeing it as a natural extension of its product line and in the hope of tapping into this projected growth (Ying, 2016). Thus, in September 2016 GoPro presented its first drone, Karma, which featured a gimbal, for stabilizing the camera, that could be detached, allowing the use of the camera without the drone (Popper, 2017). In essence, customers could attach their GoPro camera to the Karma drone, giving them the possibility to purchase a drone without the need to pay for an additional camera. Unfortunately, just as GoPro had launched its Karma drone and the consumers were getting excited about this new release, stories of the Karma drone falling from the sky started to appear in the media (Popper, 2017). Apparently, some units had battery issues and GoPro had to recall all Karma drones only two months after its release, causing a 5 month delay in delivering a properly working drone to customers. Meanwhile, DJI did not wait for GoPro to capture a share of the drone market and a week after GoPro introduced its Karma quadcopter in September 2016, it unveiled Mavic Pro—a compact, advanced, and reliable drone targeted at both consumers and professionals (Wang, 2016b). In particular, Mavic Pro has proven to fly faster and have a longer autonomy than the GoPro Karma drone (Wang, 2016b). Although GoPro had planned to release its drone earlier, the delays it incurred have given DJI the opportunity to rapidly build market shares with its new model. Even though GoPro is facing challenges to establish its model, it may well be the case that the drone market will represent an important source of income for the company in the future (Hoium, 2017).

Future Prospects

The early days of GoPro, characterized by the rapid growth and enormous success in the market, probably appear in the distant past for Nick Woodman. The success of GoPro has attracted many other competitive players such as Sony and Garmin to the action camera market. Over the years the list of competitors has been increasing, including the Chinese manufacturing giant, Xiaomi, which has stiffened the price war in the market. On the

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consumer side, clients are demanding lower prices as competitors are offering advanced alternatives for much less. As previously mentioned, GoPro had to lower the price of the HERO4 by $200 to increase sales. The latest GoPro models featuring VR solution also seem to be too expensive in a market that has turned to be very price sensitive.

As a result of the various challenges, the GoPro bottom line has been impacted heavily. The company has in fact reported a negative net income of $419 million in fiscal year 2016, partly because of the underperformance of the new products, but also because GoPro expenses have been rising every year (GoPro Inc, 2016). Furthermore, many investors are fleeing the business, which, since January 2017, has pushed the share price to below $10. GoPro has already started to take measures to return to profitability. In the first six months of 2017 the company started an internal restructuring, closing the entertainment division and cutting approximately 270 jobs. Furthermore, the company has decided to focus more on R&D to try to beat the competitors on the production of innovative software (GoPro Inc, 2016). Thus, as previously mentioned, GoPro has opened offices in Bucharest and hired approximately 100 new employees in this newly created center (Grigonis, 2017). But investors are wondering, will this be enough?

As stated in the 2016 annual report, GoPro believes that international markets outside the U.S. represent a vital growth opportunity for the company as they account for almost one-half of its sales, with the biggest markets being in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region (GoPro Inc, 2016). However, in view of the fierce competition by Xiaomi and Sony, will GoPro be able to compete against Xiaomi in China and Sony in Japan? GoPro publicly stated that the latest disappointing financial results are primarily due to the lack of sales because of the production problems that prevented them from putting the new products onto the shelves at the right time. But is this only a part of the story?

Partly because of the competitive pressure in the action camera market, but also in view of the major growth potential in the drone market, GoPro decided to diversify and develop its own drones. As GoPro already had experience with producing light-weight cameras, drones seemed to be the natural extension of their technology and diversification of their product line. But its competitors did not wait for GoPro to gain market shares in this attractive market. Only a week after GoPro announced its Karma drone, DJI, the biggest player in the drone market, introduced its newest model, which some reviewers considered more compact, advanced, and reliable than the one produced by GoPro. Even though the first attempt by GoPro at entering the drone market was problematic as a result of battery issues, the question remains whether GoPro is going to succeed in this new market.

The GoPro production problems with the new products launched in both the action camera and drone markets—the HERO5 camera and the Karma drone—spook investors and caused the company share value to falter (Masunaga, 2016). The Karma drone finally made it back onto the shelves in the U.S. on February 2017 and the end of March in Europe. Although some reviewers report that the GoPro drone does not stack up very well against the competition, many customers already own a HERO4 or HERO5 GoPro camera; for them the Karma drone may still be a very compelling option (Popper, 2017). At the time of the case, in June 2017, only few months after the launch of its drone Karma, GoPro seems to be on a tipping point. Despite the production problems associated with the launch of its new products and the strong competitive pressures in both the action and drone markets, the firm hopes that its recent entry into the drone market will help take on the challenges faced and return to profitability. Will this be the case?

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1.

2.

3.

4.

With all these questions in mind you are about to enter the headquarters of GoPro in San Mateo, California. Having just been hired as a business consultant to evaluate the recent GoPro entry into the drone market and provide recommendations to its top management team on how to move forward, you are wondering whether it was a good idea for GoPro to enter into the drone market and, more specifically, what the company should do in order to win the competitive battle and become profitable again.

Discussion Questions

What are the advantages and disadvantages of being a first mover? How does this relate to GoPro’s entry in the action camera market? What are the advantages and disadvantages of being a late mover? How does this relate to GoPro in the drone market? Do you think it was a good move for GoPro to diversify into the drone market? Explain your answer. Put yourself in the shoes of a business consultant hired by GoPro. What would you advise the top management team to do? Do you think they are on the right track to make a comeback?

Further Reading Kerin, R. A.Varadarajan, P. R., & Peterson, R. A. (1992). First-mover advantage: A synthesis, conceptual framework, and research propositions. Journal of Marketing, 56, 33–52. Gaba, V., Pan, Y., & Ungson, G. R. (2002). Timing of entry in international market: An empirical study of US Fortune 500 firms in China. Journal of International Business Studies, 33, 39–55. Lieberman, M. B ., & Montgomery, D . B . (1988). First mover advantages. Strategic Management Journal, 9, 41–58. Luo, Y.Wang, S. L .Jayaraman, V., & Zheng, Q. (2013). Governing business process offshoring: Properties, processes, and preferred modes. Journal of World Business, 48, 407–419. Markides, C., & Sosa, L. (2013). Pioneering and first mover advantages: The importance of business models. Long Range Planning, 46, 325–334. Suarez, F. F., & Lanzolla, G. (2007). The role of environmental dynamics in building a first mover advantage theory. Academy of Management Review, 32, 377–392.

References Beige Market Intelligence. (2016, December 5). Top five vendors in global action camera m a r k e t i d e n t i f i e d b y B e i g e M a r k e t I n t e l l i g e n c e. R e t r i e v e d f r o m http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/top-five-vendors-in-global-action-camera-market- identified-by-beige-market-intelligence-604794166.html Brett, G. (2015, February 28). How GoPro cameras have made nothing unfilmable, by the man who invented them. Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/11434321/How- GoPro-cameras-have-made-nothing-unfilmable-by-the-man-who-invented-them.html Brokaw, A. (2016, May 13). Yi Technology’s new action camera adds 4K video. Retrieved from http://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2016/5/13/11672806/xiaomis-YI-4k-action-camera- gearbest Burlacu, A. (2015, December 5). GoPro drops Hero4 session camera price to just $199. Retrieved from http://www.techtimes.com/articles/113447/20151205/gopro-hero4-session- drops-to-half-its-original-price-now-just-199-lowest-ever.htm

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Center for a New Amer ican Secur i ty. (n.d.) . What are drones? Retr ieved from http://drones.cnas.org/reports/what-are-drones/ G o P r o I n c. (2015). A n n u a l r e p o r t 2 0 1 5. R e t r i e v e d f r o m http://s21.q4cdn.com/291350743/files/doc_financials/2015/GoPro_-_2015_Annual_Report.pdf G o P r o I n c. (2016). A n n u a l r e p o r t 2 0 1 6. R e t r i e v e d f r o m http://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001500435/d27aa80b-ef85-405d-8517- cb32441b9a91.pdf Grigonis, H. (2017, February 28). Amid restructuring, GoPro to expand software with new office in Romania. Retrieved from http://www.digitaltrends.com/photography/gopro-bucharest- office/ Hoium, T. (2017, February 22). 3 ways GoPro Inc is losing to the competition. Retrieved from https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/02/22/3-ways-gopro-inc-is-losing-to-the-competition.aspx Kleinman, J. (2015, March 3). Xiaomi announces a $64 GoPro competitor. Retrieved from https://www.technobuffalo.com/2015/03/03/xiaomi-announces-a-64-gopro-competitor/ Lorenzetti, L. (2014, June 26). Investors bet big on GoPro, driving its shares up more than 30%. Ret r ieved f rom http://fortune.com/2014/06/26/investors-go-big-on-gopro-driving-its- shares-up-more-than-30/ Mac, R. (2012, December 20). Foxconn buys stake in camera maker GoPro, turning founder into a billionaire. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2012/12/20/foxconn- buys-stake-in-camera-maker-gopro-turning-founder-into-a-billionaire/#541ab2456f13 Mac, R. (2013a, March 4). The mad billionaire behind GoPro: The world’s hottest camera company. R e t r i e v e d f r o m https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2013/03/04/the-mad- billionaire-behind-gopro-the-worlds-hottest-camera-company/#58103d8d7471 Mac, R. (2013b, March 4). GoPro evolution: From 35mm film to America’s fastest-growing camera company. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2013/03/04/gopro- evolution-from-35mm-film-to-americas-fastest-growing-camera-company/#4858f4064069 Mac, R. (2013c, March 13). Five startup lessons from GoPro founder and billionaire Nick Woodman. Retr ieved from https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2013/03/13/five-startup- lessons-from-gopro-founder-and-billionaire-nick-woodman/#69b17a5d546e Masunaga, S. (2016, November 4). Production problems with GoPro’s Hero5 camera spook investors. Retrieved from http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tn-gopro-20161104-story.html Moritz, R. (2012, June 12). Guts, glory, and megapixels: The story of GoPro. Retrieved from http://www.popularmechanics.com/adventure/sports/a7703/guts-glory-and-megapixels-the- story-of-gopro-8347639/ Moskwa, W. (2016, May 9). World drone market seen nearing $127 billion in 2020, PwC says. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-09/world-drone-market- seen-nearing-127-billion-in-2020-pwc-says Oyedele, A. (2017, March 17). GoPro finally realizes that smartphones can do exactly what its cameras can. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.my/gopro-woodman-smartphones- competition-2017-3/#AMgmr9Wplff44yQ7.97 Pavle. (2016, January 16). First ever GoPro camera – Hero 35 mm – Full story. Retrieved from https://pevly.com/first-ever-gopro-camera-hero-35-mm-full-story/ Popper, B. (2017, March 15). Bad karma: GoPro’s first drone does not impress. Retrieved from http://www.theverge.com/2017/3/15/14922328/gopro-karma-drone-review Shontell, A. (2014, June 27). The life and awesomeness of a surfer-turned-billionaire, GoPro founder Nick Woodman. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.in/tech/the-life-and- awesomeness-of-a-surfer-turned-billionaire-gopro-founder-nick- woodman/slidelist/37275472.cms Sun, L. (2014, September 2). GoPro investors can’t ignore these 3 key problems. Retrieved from https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/09/02/gopro-investors-cant-ignore-these-3-

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key-problems.aspx Tech Stock Insider. (2016, May 19). According to TechStockInsider.com, big opportunity for s m a l l a c t i o n c a m e r a m a k e r s a s G o P r o s u f f e r s. R e t r i e v e d f r o m http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/according-techstockinsidercom-big-opportunity- small-action-camera-makers-as-gopro-suffers-2126858.htm Tractica. (2015, July 21). Commercial drone shipments to surpass 2.6 million units annually by 2025. Retrieved from https://www.tractica.com/newsroom/press-releases/commercial-drone- shipments-to-surpass-2-6-million-units-annually-by-2025-according-to-tractica/ Vanian, J. (2017, February 2). GoPro’s upcoming year looks to be scary and action packed. Retrieved from http://fortune.com/2017/02/02/gopro-hero5-karma-drone/ Wang, S. (2016a, February 3). GoPro earnings plunge after new camera fails to impress. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-03/gopro-earnings-plunge- as-hero4-camera-failed-to-inspire-sales Wang, S. (2016b, September 27). China’s DJI unveils new drone to compete with GoPro’s Karma. Retr ieved f rom https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-27/china-s-dji- unveils-new-drone-to-compete-with-gopro-s-karma Ying, W. (2016, December 13). D J I s e e s j u m p i n r e v e n u e. Ret r ieved f rom http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/tech/2016-12/13/content_27649387.htm http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781526445902

SAGE SAGE Business Cases © Niccolò Pisani and Petra van den Dolder 2018

GoPro, Inc.: Will Entry into the Drone Market Help its Comeback?Page 11 of 11