GoPro Plans To Bring Back Its Karma Drone This Year After Last Year's Recall

After an unsuccessful launch last year leading to the recall of nearly 2500 units of the Karma Drone, GoPro announced that it plans to relaunch the drone this late year in a bid to boost the company back up.

According to TechCrunch, the Karma Drone was recalled in November last year, lasting only 16 days in the market. The recall was due to some cases of power failure mid-flight, causing the drone to fall from the sky after a couple of minutes of flight.

Those who bought the $799 Karma Drone were refunded, and those who brought the Karma Drone and Hero 5 package had to return the whole package and not just the drone. But the recall was not fast enough, as videos of GoPro's drones falling from the sky made its way to YouTube.

The Karma Drone recall took a heavy toll on GoPro, causing stock prices to fall over the last quarter of 2016 and forcing the company to do massive layoffs. As per the Verge, GoPro laid off 15 percent of the company's staff after the recall.

For now, GoPro has not announced when the Karma Drone will come back, but the company is running some final tests and will provide more details on the re-launch some time early February. Whether the drone will keep the same specs or will have some new ones is still unknown.

Once the Karma Drone hits the market again, it'll face heavy competition -- one heavy competitor it has to face is DJI's phantom drone series, which has become one of the best drone series in the market. And with the recall of the drone's recall happening before the holiday season last year, it'll be facing a lot of scrutiny from consumers.

Just before the October 23 launch of the Karma Drone last year, GoPro launched it's GoPro Hero 5, the latest of its top-of-the-line action cameras that the company is known for. But whether overall sales from the Hero 5 will keep the company in stable waters is yet to be known in the company's last quarter 2016 report.