GoPro has been acquired and is getting into ‘defense, government, robotics and aerospace’

GoPro suddenly looks like a very different company than it did just last week. First, YouTuber Mark “Markiplier” Fischbach became the company’s single largest shareholder, without disclosing that in a sponsored review that came out a week later. Now, almost the entire company has been bought by Starman Holding for $285 million in cash, which Starman is characterizing as a “merger” with its subsidiary Starman Optical.

While GoPro has always been best known as the company that makes consumer action cameras, the press release takes a bit of a different tone: founder and CEO Nick Woodman now calls GoPro “a leading American imaging and optical solutions company, addressing important areas of national security related to cameras, optics and AI infrastructure.”

“The combination of GoPro’s world-class optical expertise and intellectual property with Starman’s advanced transceiver capabilities and U.S. manufacturing platform creates a unique opportunity. Together, we intend to bring production of these critical components back to the United States,” reads a quote from Starman Holding’s CEO Charles Tebele.

What is Starman Holding? According to Tebele’s online bio, it’s got a lot of fingers in a lot of pies — but you might recognize its phone case brands Incipio, Incase, Griffin, and Survivor. It appears that Starman Holding owns Onward Brands, which acquired Vinci Brands, a division of Armor Acquisition, which bought them from Incipio back in 2021.

You might also recognize its brand Digital Gadgets, which reportedly donated to NY governor Kathy Hochul’s campaign around the same time it secured $637 million in contracts for COVID-19 tests, then sued the administration over subsequent bids.

Technically, an SEC filing reveals, a company named Action Acquisitions LLC will become the parent company of GoPro.

Amid its financial troubles — it lost most of its publicly traded value years ago and had $92 million in debt — GoPro had already announced it would begin defense and aerospace consulting in April. The new press release says GoPro will “continue to fully support its existing consumer products” and grow in consumer, but it sounds a bit like a pivot.

I’m just spitballing here, but when I think about tiny cameras, optical transceivers, and defense manufacturing, it reminds me of those long reels of optical fiber that come out the back of attack drones — and how US consumer drones have largely been set aside in favor of war.

Starman says shareholders will keep 10 percent of the company’s shares; Markiplier purchased 8.5 percent. It’s not clear if the YouTuber plans to keep them, or will get a rapid payday; the value of the stock doubled overnight, though it’s currently settling down.

The deal should close by the end of the year, according to the press release.

According to an SEC filing, GoPro founder CEO Nick Woodman sent this email to staff today:

From: Nick Woodman

To: Employees All

Subject: Confidential Update

Team GoPro,

Please respect this email as confidential and do not forward.

Today, we announced that GoPro entered into a definitive agreement to merge with Starman Optical, a privately held U.S.-based optical-photonics company. I encourage you to read the press release we posted to our website.

This transaction is a major milestone in the strategic review process we announced in May, and I believe it’s a very positive path for GoPro, our employees, our customers and our shareholders.

Starman Optical has the resources to help us scale-expand our consumer product roadmap, grow our software and subscription business, and broaden the categories we compete to include commercial and defense markets. And they are very strategically positioned in the AI infrastructure industry as an up and coming U.S. manufacturer of optical transceivers that we believe will bring in meaningful high margin revenue to help fund GoPro’s growth initiatives into new markets-establishing GoPro over time as a diversified optics and imaging company across consumer, commercial and defense while creating significant value for shareholders.

To do that, they need our collective experience to execute and succeed. It’s our collective opportunity to rise to the occasion in each of our respective roles. If you believe you can take on more than you are today-more scope, more ownership, more impact-now is the time to show it. And if you’re already executing at a high level, thank you. Let’s keep developing and shipping great products on time and at the quality. That’s critical as we move forward.

At this time, we won’t be sharing more specifics regarding the go-forward strategy. We’ll share more details after the deal is closed, which we expect to happen before the end of the year. In the meantime, we will continue to operate the business as usual.

I’m aware of the continued uncertainty this news brings. Please refer to my email above and connect with your manager if you have any questions or concerns.

Thank you for the GoPro you’ve helped build to date. Moving forward, we build the future GoPro into something broader, more diversified and capable than ever before.

In a separate email to partners, GoPro writes that:

Day to day, your GoPro experience does not change. We will continue to operate the business as usual. GoPro will remain a publicly listed company and will continue to fully support our existing products and our subscription and cloud service while developing a broader, diversified product roadmap. Products, services and support continue as they are. The current product lineup stays in production and remains available for purchase.

Update, September 1st: Added details from SEC filings, which had not yet appeared at the SEC at the time of GoPro’s press release.