The Information: ‘Inside Tony Fadell’s Struggle to Build Nest’

This story by Reed Albergotti for The Information is absolutely brutal. I’m not sure I’ve ever read an article quite like it, with on-the-record quotes documenting an utterly broken company culture. An extraordinary airing of a ton of dirty laundry. Exhibit A. Exhibit B, regarding the relationship between Tony Fadell and his Nest co-founder Matt Rogers:

Mr. Fadell attended Mr. Rogers’ wedding last year. Afterward, Mr. Fadell ordered Mr. Rogers to cancel his month-long honeymoon in June, Mr. Rogers confirmed. A spokeswoman for Nest said it was a critical time at the company: Nest was announcing a refresh of its entire product line. When Mr. Rogers refused, Mr. Fadell told him that if he went, he wouldn’t have a job when he came back. Mr. Rogers went anyway. Mr. Fadell did not follow up on his threat.

How exactly The Information got Fadell and Rogers to participate with this story boggles my mind. The backstory behind how this story came to be is probably just as interesting as the story itself — some real Machiavellian stuff.

(The Information is a paywall publication, but they now offer “sharing” links — hopefully mine will work for DF’s readership. The Information is well worth the subscription price, in my opinion.)

★ Thursday, 24 March 2016