INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Petnet, the smart pet feeder backed by investors including Petco, recently experienced a week-long system outage affecting its
second-generation SmartFeeders
While the startup customer service tweeted over the weekend that its SmartFeeders and app functionality have been restored, Petnet lack of
responsiveness continues to leave many customers frustrated and confused.
Petnet first announced on Feb
14 that it was investigating a system outage affecting its second-generation SmartFeeders that made the feeders appear to be offline
The company said in a tweet that the SmartFeeders were still able to dispense on schedule, but several customers replied that their devices
had also stopped dispensing food or weren&t dispensing it on schedule.
On Feb
19, the company said that it is &working closely with our third-party service provider in regards to the outage,& before announcing on Feb
22 that the SmartFeeders are returning online.
During that time, customers voiced frustration at the company lack of responses to their
questions on Twitter and Facebook
Messages to the company support email and CEO Carlos Herrera were undeliverable.
TechCrunch tried contacting their emails and got delivery
A message sent to their Twitter account was also not replied to
We have contacted the company again for comment.
Petnet also experienced a similar system outage last month.
According to Crunchbase,
Petnet.io has raised $14.9 million since it was founded in 2012, including a Series A led by Petco.
In a statement sent to TechCrunch over
the weekend before Petnet said the outage was resolved, a Petco representative said &Petco is a minor and passive investor in Petnet, but we
do not have any involvement in the company operations nor insight into the system outage they are currently experiencing.
