On one level, things are going well for Topspin: the D2C merchandising firm’s most high-profile deals yet with Spotify and Beats came to fruition this month. Yet all is not well with the company: yesterday it saw a round of significant layoffs. Staff tweeted the news. “A majority of @topspinmedia just got laid off, and I am lost in LA. A very sad day for such a great company,” wrote Jessica Savage last night, while colleague Alia Rodriques added “Currently at a bar w/my co-workers who also got laid off today… half the family gone. Seriously our team was like a family.” There’s no official statement yet bar a confirmation to GigaOm that there were some layoffs. Topspin’s boss Ian Rogers left the company to head up Beats Music a year ago, while another senior executive, Bob Moczydlowsky, left to join Twitter later in the year. The streaming service deals had seemed to herald a brighter future for Topspin, but this week’s news can’t help but raise questions about that future – and the implications for Spotify and Beats’ much-vaunted merchandise features too.
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Tools: Kaiber
In the year or so since its launch, AI startup Kaiber has been making waves,…