Upstart digital comics service Omnibus loses its co-founder (and head software engineer)

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As Amazon's ComiXology, the quintessential app for reading comics digitally, began to fall into disrepair, one of several competing services to jump into the fray was Omnibus. Since it's launch in 2022, Omnibus has picked up deals to carry all the new releases by Image Comics, BOOM! Studios, IDW Publishing, Dark Horse Comics, and several others - as well as venture capitalist investments of at least a million dollars. But now, it's lost one of its two co-founders - and its lead software engineer.

Omnibus co-founder Kenny Meyers has left the digital comics service as of December 2023, under terms explained by him to be less than ideal. Prior to launching Omnibus in 2022, Meyers served as senior software engineer for Reddit, Meta, Adobe, and Facebook.

"Omnibus was the dream for me, a project I conceived, initiated and wholly dedicated myself to for the past 18 months," Meyers wrote on LinkedIn. "I was excited to bring the digital comic store to the next level for all comic lovers like me, especially with the dissolution of Comixology."

Meyers says his decision to leave Omnibus "wasn't mutual," but he leaves with "tremendous pride in the many contributions I made to Omnibus in every aspect of the business."

Leading Omnibus now is the remaining founder Travis Schmeisser, who acts as company CEO. Following the original publication of this article, we were able to speak to Schmeisser.

"Both parties agreed to go in a different direction with the team. I don’t view this as a setback, but as a necessary development for Omnibus," Schmeisser tells Popverse. "Kenny has been gone for several months and day-to-day operations have continued as normal. Omnibus has had a team of other software engineers in place since last summer. That team actually built the entire web store and have been handling all of our backend needs since then. The company is moving faster than ever and our new Senior Software Engineer Jon is a massive catch for our specific technology needs. Omnibus is in great shape and I’m excited for what you’ll see us ship in 2024.

In the wake of Meyer's departure, a senior software engineer was hired, and started at the company this month.

As for Meyers, although his time with Omnibus is over, his time creating things isn't.

"What’s next? Omnibus reignited a dormant passion for creation, so I’m going to keep building things."

The digital comics app Omnibus is currently available on iPads, iPhones, and in a browser system. An Android version is in development.

Here's a guide to the major digital comics services out there for you.