smart homesGraveyard archive2014-2025

Latch

Latch was a New York smart-lock and access-software company that went public in 2021 via a Tishman Speyer-sponsored SPAC at a roughly $1.56B valuation. From 2022 it disclosed improper revenue recognition that rendered its financials unreliable, triggering restatements, executive resignations, deep layoffs, and a Nasdaq delisting. The company survived but narrowed to pure proptech, rebranding as DOOR in 2025 and abandoning the consumer smart home.

Years active

2014-2025

Peak valuation

$1.6B

Peak headcount

201-500

From walk-up to Wall Street darling

Founded in 2014 by Luke Schoenfelder, Thomas Meyerhoffer, Brian Jones, and Dhruva Rajendra, Latch built electronic locks and a software layer, LatchOS, aimed at apartment buildings rather than individual homeowners. Its pitch was to sell access as a system to developers and property managers, with hardware purchased or reserved across more than 300,000 units. The strategy attracted real-estate heavyweight Tishman Speyer, whose blank-check vehicle, TS Innovation Acquisitions Corp., agreed to take Latch public during the 2021 SPAC frenzy.

A $1.56B SPAC built on shaky numbers

Latch completed its SPAC merger in June 2021 at a roughly $1.56B valuation, raising about $453M in cash and trading on Nasdaq as LTCH. The deck was aggressive: net revenue of just $18M in 2020 and a $61M EBITDA loss, yet projections forecast revenue reaching $877M by 2025. By August 2022 the company warned the SEC of material errors and possible irregularities in how it recognized hardware revenue, saying results back to 2019 could not be relied upon. Some salespeople had negotiated terms with customers that the company failed to account for.

Restatements, resignations, and delisting

The audit-committee probe forced restatements and a cascade of departures. CEO and chairman Luke Schoenfelder resigned effective January 11, 2023, alongside the interim CFO and chief accounting officer. Latch laid off more than half its staff that July, and after missing filing deadlines, Nasdaq moved to suspend and delist its shares in August 2023, pushing the stock to the OTC market. Its market value collapsed from roughly $1.56B to under $100M.

Reborn as DOOR, gone from the consumer home

Latch survived as a corporate entity but abandoned its original identity. After acquiring Honest Day's Work in 2023 and HelloTech in 2024 to build a services arm, the company rebranded as DOOR on August 12, 2025, repositioning entirely around B2B 'building intelligence' for multifamily operators. The Latch brand and its consumer smart-home ambitions ended even though DOOR continues to operate under the legal name Latch, Inc. and trades under LTCH.

What worked, what broke

What worked

Pioneered selling smart access as a building-wide system to developers and property managers rather than to individual consumers.
Built LatchOS, a software platform unifying door locks, intercoms, guest and delivery access, and building operations.
Secured backing from real-estate heavyweight Tishman Speyer and reached more than 300,000 apartment units purchased or reserved.
Completed a 2021 SPAC merger at a roughly $1.56B valuation, raising about $453M in cash.
Survived an accounting scandal and delisting to relaunch as a focused B2B proptech company, DOOR.

What broke

Improperly recognized hardware revenue, making financial results from 2019 onward unreliable and unable to be relied upon.
Salespeople negotiated customer terms the company failed to identify or properly account for in its books.
The audit-committee investigation forced restatements, the resignation of CEO Schoenfelder, and the exit of finance leadership.
Missed SEC filing deadlines led Nasdaq to suspend trading and delist the stock to the OTC market in 2023.
Aggressive SPAC-era projections ($877M revenue by 2025 off an $18M base) proved wildly disconnected from reality.

Sources

Obituary authored Jun 30, 2026 via Sonnet 4.5 + web_search.