CyanogenMod is now moving away from their "full stack" approach in selling Cyanogen OS as they unveil a new CEO and their new Cyanogen Modular OS program.
Kirt McMaster has moved on to be an Executive Chairman of the company while the new Cyanogen CEO is now Lior Tal with a new vision on how the company will proceed. In the past, Cyanogen has focused on selling their Cyanogen OS to smartphone manufacturers that want a more customized version of Android on their devices.
Unfortunately, there have not been many deals and the company did not grow fast enough to meet today's demands. Cyanogen Modular OS program will be the company's new focus but that does not mean that the Cyanogen OS will not be sold anymore to OEMs, Digital Trends has learned.
McMaster said in an email to Cyanogen employees: "We should all be proud of these achievements and the devices shipped... but in startup world even good work may not be good enough to win. I realized at this time we needed not only a product strategy that was more modular but also someone that saw growth as a 100M+ challenge not a 10M+ challenge."
The Cyanogen Modular OS program will allow companies to modify a certain part of Android that they want. Microsoft added Cortana through the Cyanogen Modular OS program for Android smartphones, TechCrunch reported.
Another use of the program was when the Redmond-based company added Skype for Android's default dialer which made it more convenient for users to contact their friends on the app. There are a lot of other possible uses and Cyanogen hopes to provide them with their Modular OS program.
With the restructure of the company, there have been layoffs that happened earlier this year. About 20 percent of their staff have been let go in order for the company to survive.
Time will tell whether Cyanogen's decision to focus on their MOD program will be worth it for the company. The Cyanogen OS business may still be alive and there could be OEMs still wanting to take the OS for their devices.