BlackBerry kills BB10, will work on mid-range Android phones instead
The latest turnaround strategy for formerly-dominant smartphone maker BlackBerry is reportedly centered on mid-range Android devices, as the company will no longer manufacture new phones based on its own BlackBerry 10 operating system.
BlackBerry's change of direction comes after enterprise customers -- the only remaining significant pocket of loyalty for the company -- complained that its first Android entry was too expensive, CEO John Chen said this week. Chen admitted that the release of the $700 Priv may have been a tactical error.
"The fact that we came out with a high end phone [as our first Android device] was probably not as wise as it should have been," Chen told Abu Dhabi paper The National.
"A lot of enterprise customers have said to us, 'I want to buy your phone but $700 is a little too steep for me. I'm more interested in a $400 device'," he added.
The growing duopoly between Android and iOS has squeezed BlackBerry's own in-house operating system out of the market. BlackBerry will continue to support BlackBerry 10 -- once heralded as the company's future -- for an unspecified period of time, but will not release new BB10-based devices.
Still, Chen believes his firm has a chance for differentiation based on BlackBerry's long history of strong security and integration in corporate environments.
"We're the only people who really secure Android, taking the security features of BlackBerry that everyone knows us for and make it more reachable for the market," he said.
BlackBerry's change of direction comes after enterprise customers -- the only remaining significant pocket of loyalty for the company -- complained that its first Android entry was too expensive, CEO John Chen said this week. Chen admitted that the release of the $700 Priv may have been a tactical error.
"The fact that we came out with a high end phone [as our first Android device] was probably not as wise as it should have been," Chen told Abu Dhabi paper The National.
"A lot of enterprise customers have said to us, 'I want to buy your phone but $700 is a little too steep for me. I'm more interested in a $400 device'," he added.
The growing duopoly between Android and iOS has squeezed BlackBerry's own in-house operating system out of the market. BlackBerry will continue to support BlackBerry 10 -- once heralded as the company's future -- for an unspecified period of time, but will not release new BB10-based devices.
Still, Chen believes his firm has a chance for differentiation based on BlackBerry's long history of strong security and integration in corporate environments.
"We're the only people who really secure Android, taking the security features of BlackBerry that everyone knows us for and make it more reachable for the market," he said.
Comments
The race to the bottom begins for BlackBerry unfortunately.
I also wanted to evaluate BB for investment reasons. There is much function missing in the Playbook software.
It's SW hasn't been updated for over a year and I'm losing regularly Apps I use.
The Apps are going, no App updates and no new Apps !
Soon I'll have to trash my BB Playbook, as I trashed my Palm.
Of course my iPhone4 is gradually losing it's iOS functions, even as an iPad, but my iPhone5c is kept up to date.
I know a few personal buyers of the BB phones, they aren't aware of how much better the iPhone is.
They are just stuck on BB, probably because they had been getting cheap clear out models
and they believed BB saying the BB10 was leading edge. Also they like the BB security story.
So how can BB use android and continue to say they are secure? Android is Google spyware, period!
Nice knowing you BB !!!
now, just a few days ago in Blackberry's last quarterly analysts call, after the results came out, he retiterated his previous statement that they needed sales of 5 million for the year to make a profit on hardware. He then stated that he thought they could break even on 3 million sales a year. But the last quarter, they sold just 600,000 phones, which was a mixed bag of BB10 and the Priv. He then said that there would be no more new BB10 phones, and that they would have medium priced models of their Android line. But what does that matter? It's thought they sold about 400,000 Privs last quarter. But even the full 600,000 sales were just 0.2% worldwide marketshare.
so yes, they can be belittled for coming out with a premium priced middle line phone in a time when consumers, businesses and government agencies are running away from their products. And it's in the Android market, which isn't kind to flagship phones, a market where even Samsung's Galaxy models are rapidly discounted after they come out. A market where Chen, in describing the security model of the Priv, said that is was about as secure as a Samsung Galaxy model with Knox. In other words, just middling secure.
why not just go and buy the much better Samsung product? And that's exactly what is happening.
What does John Chen do at this company? Doesn't he get paid the big bucks to know what type of phone to release and in what price range?