A PicoBrew home beer crafting system is displayed during the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) on ... [+] January 7, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. The swirl of technology at the Consumer Electronics Show seeped into all aspects of modern life, even happy hour. Those inspired to reach for a cocktail after navigating seemingly endless CES show floors packed with dizzying displays and throngs of gawkers and talkers were in luck... there were gadgets for that. / AFP / Glenn CHAPMAN (Photo credit should read GLENN CHAPMAN/AFP via Getty Images)

At one point, PicoBrew was considered the future of the beer industry. The home brewing system was drumming up huge money from crowdfund platforms and beer lovers were geeking out over the DIY brewing machines.

The company was poised to make home brewing systems as commonplace as microwaves or blenders.

PicoBrew’s systems had inspired a wave of home automation brewing systems: LG announced its take on the system last January, and AB InBev has partnered with Keurig for countertop beer and cocktail machines. 

But per a report from The Spoon, PicoBrew is headed towards the end. 

In February, the company filed for bankruptcy in Washington state, and moved to court-managed receivership. In April, PicoBrew was put up for auction. 

Late last week the company was purchased by a former bridge lender, and the founding team (CEO Bill Mitchell, his brother Jim Mitchell and Avi Geiger) was let go. 

This leaves the company under completely new management and without the team that made the brand a trailblazer. 

For background, PicoBrew was the brainchild of Bill Mitchell, a food scientist and former Microsoft MSFT VP.

The tech hardware company burst onto the scene via a Kickstarter for its Pico Zymatic in 2014. It was thought of as the Keurig of beer: The counter-top Zymatic unit made beer with just the click of a mouse ⁠.

The machine, the size of a microwave, hooked up to a re-usable, 5-liter keg. Users order kits of grains, malts and hops and built their beers to taste. Flip the switch, and the machine ran the operation of an entire brewery, right from a countertop.  RFID chips in each machine fix the correct instructions to the correct grains, and a display screen progresses the process. Cool, right? 

After the Zymatic took off in 2014, the brand began partnering with beloved brewers, like Dogfish Head and Elysian, for collaborative ‘PicoPaks’ —pre-packaged ingredient modules. 

Anheuser-Busch’s investment arm ZX Ventures caught wind of the popularity acquired a minority stake in PicoBrew.

Then came 2017’s Pico C —a model designed for beginner-level brewers. It was one of the highest funded food-related Kickstarters of all time.

So PicoBrew started rolling out new machines — the current portfolio includes brewing machines for varying ranges of home-brewers (all the way up to ‘brewery professionals’) and a PicoStill, for the home-distiller. Ther

As their product range expanded, the brand looked for a second round of institutional funding at the end of 2019. Mitchell noted that the company had until mid-December to close a round of funding as part of an agreement with a bridge lending group. They were unsuccessful, leading to the company ending up in the hands of a ‘former bridge lender’ after a recent auction.

There were concerns — some said the machine was too complicated for home brewers but too simple for experienced beer breweries. And it lacked affordability— though the machines required an initial investment of over $500, ingredients still worked out to roughly $2 a beer.

But the main cause for PicoBrew’s demise was the portfolio diversity. After the success of the Zymatic and the Pico, the company started expanding rapidly. They turned out equipment for craft breweries. They started selling cold-brew coffee makers, and home-distilling machines. They were no longer a company dedicated to craft beer —they were trying to make a wide range of products for a wide range of people.

They waded into new markets and cluttered up their portfolio, something Mitchell called a “noble failure”. 

What’s next? It’s unclear what the new owners plan to do with the company.

Will the new owners keep the servers running for existing owners of PicoBrew products? The company could open-source the software so PicoBrew users can continue to use the apps and software, but with little known about the new owners, it's hard to predict.

Although PicoBrew was the first machine of its type, it’s not alone in the market anymore — there are a wave of homebrew automation devices from both beer brands (like Beersmith, Blichman, The Brewie+ and Grainfather) and more lifestyle consumer brands like LG. It’s a loud market for PicoBrew to continue competing in. 

An online auction of warehouse equipment and inventory seems to hint that operations are slowing down.