Evernote CEO sets out hardware ambitions

cloud

Note taking app maker Evernote has designs on launching its own branded devices, the company's CEO Phil Libin has revealed.

The company's app allows users to sync and share notes across multiple devices including PCs, smartphones and tablets via the cloud.

During an interview with the IDG News Service, Libin stopped short of explaining what kind of device or hardware the firm is planning to bring to market.

Instead, he said the company's aim is to develop hardware that is "new and magical" and won't necessarily fit into an existing product category.

He also said the firm has no plans to follow Microsoft's lead and manufacture the devices in-house just yet.

"We won't actually do the manufacturing, but we'll do the co-design [with our partners] together," he said.

"Eventually, in a few years three, four, five I think we'll be ready to do something ourselves," he added.

Libin also shed some light on the work Evernote has been doing to assure its 50 million-strong user base in the wake of last month's hack.

In a blog post at the time, the company insisted no data had been accessed, changed or lost as a result of the attack, although the perpetrators did gain access to some usernames, email addresses and encrypted passwords.

As a result, the company is planning to introduce two-factor authentication to its login procedures in the near future, as well as some other unspecified security features in a bid to win back users who may have deserted the platform as a result.

"People who were regular users all just came right back in, but people who maybe hadn't logged in a few months, some of those haven't come back in yet," he explained.

Caroline Donnelly is the news and analysis editor of IT Pro and its sister site Cloud Pro, and covers general news, as well as the storage, security, public sector, cloud and Microsoft beats. Caroline has been a member of the IT Pro/Cloud Pro team since March 2012, and has previously worked as a reporter at several B2B publications, including UK channel magazine CRN, and as features writer for local weekly newspaper, The Slough and Windsor Observer. She studied Medical Biochemistry at the University of Leicester and completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Magazine Journalism at PMA Training in 2006.