CyanogenMod is an open-source system for smartphones by Cyanogen Inc., which is based on the Android platform. It aims to create a better version than what Google provides, promising more features and more control for users. Cyanogen CEO Kirt McMaster said that they are putting a "bullet through Google's head." One year after he made that announcement, the company is shutting down.
Cyanogen Inc is a start up based in Palo Alto, California. According to ZDNet, the company burned over $100-million in venture-capital quickly, and its allies even faster. It had a hardware partnership with One Plus which failed, and by 2016, they started letting go of employees.
Fortune reported that Cyanogen's announcement was made on Christmas Eve, and that their shut down is a "deathblow" for the open-source project. The company's users, which they claim to be about 50 million, are left in the dark. Many are now concerned that OnePlus smartphone users who are on Cyanogen's operating system won't be getting further updates. OnePlus is yet to comment on this issue.
In July, Cyanogen's CTO and cofounder, Steve Kondik assured everyone that Cyanogen is isn't going anywhere, and that it has not discontinued its efforts towards the company's goal. However, the company had massive internal issues between founders, executives, and the development team, and around the same month, 20 percent of employees have been laid off.
Kondik blamed "bad business deals" and blamed McMaster for the company's failure to achieve its goals. McMaster stepped down as CEO in October.
But in a private Google+ CyanogenMod developer group post, Kondik proposed that the Android clone continue as a crowdsourced program under a name. The new take will be called LineageOS, and the project is still in stealth mode. Kondik is said to be directing this project, and that the forked operating system is expected to be built on top of the existing CyanogenMod 13 and 14 versions.
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