Color labs

Controversy and demise

When it launched, the application had around 1 million downloads. By September 2011, the service had a little under 100,000 active users. In June 2011, less than three months after the company officially launched, Pham left Color, followed quickly by Chief Product Officer DJ Patil.

In the weeks following Color's initial launch, controversy surrounded the startup's $41 million funding and mixed reviews on the product. The initial launch confused users with the application's interface and purpose. Its initial rating in the App Store was 2 out of 5 stars. In an interview with Robert Scoble in April 2011, Pham and Nguyen admitted that Color's launch was a wasted opportunity, sharing: "We threw out a network you don’t know how to get good at…We threw a mountain at people."

In October 2012, media reports indicated that Color's board of directors had voted to shut down the company. Other sources denied that the company was shutting down but suggested that it was possibly preparing to be acquired by another company or for another major transformative event. Reports included that the staff would be sold to Apple for $2 to $7 million. In November, Color Labs announced that the app would be shut down at the end of 2012.