Essential, the mobile device company founded by Android creator Andy Rubin, dismissed nearly a third of its staff after producing only lacklustre results in its attempt to break into the premium handset market.

Bloomberg reported the company let go of around 30 per cent of its approximately 120-member workforce. The cuts were said to impact staff across the company’s hardware, marketing and sales operations.

A company representative told the outlet in a statement that slashing its staff was a “difficult decision”, but added it is “confident that our sharpened product focus will help us deliver a truly game changing consumer product”.

The news followed reports in May that Essential cancelled development of its second edition smartphone, and Rubin was considering putting the company up for sale.

Essential, which was founded in 2015, launched its first handset with Sprint as its US operator partner in May 2017. However, the device failed to gain traction among users, as analyst company IDC estimated the company shipped fewer than 90,000 units of the device in the six months after launch.