Whistle (company)

The idea for Whistle grew out of current CEO Ben Jacobs' experiences on petcare accounts at Bain & Company, and was developed with COO Steve Eidelman while researching the petcare industry for venture capital firm DCM.[1] They hired Kevin Lloyd as CTO and the three founded Whistle in 2012.[1][2] The company started with 20 employees and raised $6 million in a venture funding round led by DCM.[3] Other investors included the former CEO of Mars Petcare and the president of Humane Society Silicon Valley.[2]

Whistle's first product, an activity monitor for dogs that tracked their exercise, was released in 2013.[4] The company raised an additional $10 million in a Series A funding round and $15 million in Series B.[1][5] A February 2014 agreement with PetSmart placed the Whistle device in all the company's stores and led to co-marketing efforts.[6] Whistle also began working with veterinary schools to analyze the data collected from the app.[7] For example, in 2014 the Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania used data from Whistle devices for their research on chronic pain conditions in dogs;[8] and researchers at the College of Veterinary Medicine at North Carolina State University have used it to study epilepsy in dogs.[9] The company also has an advisory panel of veterinarians.[2][10]

Whistle began experimenting with the SigFox internet of things network for its devices in May 2014.[11][12][13] In January 2015, the company acquired Tagg, a competing startup based in San Diego, for an undisclosed sum for its battery life and location-tracking intellectual property, and Tagg's CEO, Scott Neuberger, joined Whistle.[14] Tagg had started as a Qualcomm subsidiary in 2010 and released its tracking device one year before Whistle.[1][15] By 2015, Whistle had distributed 100,000 devices and had about 40 employees.[1]

In April 2016, Whistle was acquired by Mars Petcare, the pet product subsidiary of the food and candybar maker Mars, for $117 million.[16]

Whistle produces and markets wearable monitoring devices for pets. The Whistle Activity Monitor, which is sometimes called a "Fitbit for dogs", tracks the duration, time, and intensity of a pet's exercise, then gives the data to users over Wi-Fi networks or to a phone app using Bluetooth.[1][16][17][18] The GPS pet tracker is for finding lost pets.[19] It also produces an alert if the pet's behavior changes, for example a reduction in sleep, indicating anxiety.[18][4]

The GPS and location tracking product was announced in May 2014.[20][21] An integration with Jawbone Up that May allowed Jawbone users to compare their exercise to their dog's in the same app.[12] In February 2017, Whistle 3 was introduced. It is half the size of prior models and intended for smaller dogs or cats.[22]

• Official website