All Things Digital reported the following “Lenovo’s long-rumored bid for languishing smartphone pioneer BlackBerry might have gained its legs were it not for the interference of the Canadian government.”
But the question remains would the Canadian government now bankroll BlackBerry out of trouble as they prevented its sale? I doubt it. So if the government was so concerned about its security surely it should be offering more support.
What do you think ?
John Chen tells Reuters that he expects to continue phone development, arguing that there are “enough ingredients” for long-term success. Executives at the company can’t rest so easily, however, as the new CEO intends a shake-up of BlackBerry’s management that will include some outsiders.
BlackBerry will now raise $1bn investment in to its business. Can BlackBerry resurrect itself like Apple once did? As much as I would love to see them succeed, I just don’t see how this can be done with competition being as strong as it is. And the stock market aren’t happy too. Blackberry shares have fallen by 17%.
BlackBerry has confirmed that it now has 20m new users for its BBM service on android and iOS. It also confirmed it will be adding new features including video calls.
At present it is free but obviously needs to make some money from the service. This will include ads and maybe other in app purchases.
It is often difficult to find the reviews of devices and accessories I have written about, so below is a quick way to find all the articles for the key reviews. Or use the top right search box to search for anything on my blog.
Netatmo Urban Weather Station Review
Audio Technica ATH-AD900x Headphone review
Olloclip 3 in 1 Lens review for iPhone 5
BlackBerry announced that in 24 hours there had been 10m downloads of its iOS and android BBM app. That is a decent number of downloads, a number which has pushed it to the top of the downloads chart.
But is there a future for the app?
This is a difficult question. BBM has competition from many other messaging services like iMessage, ChatOn, WhatsApp and Viber. WhatsApp for example recently announced it had 350m users. Now that 10m downloads does not seem that good. Also WhatsApp makes money from their app charging £1 a year after the first year and for every year thereafter. A modest amount that most people are happy to pay for.
So firstly, BBM has to catch up and overtake established players. Second it has to make money, so at some point it either has to have ads appearing or make a charge for its service.
But is it any different from the other services on offer? Yes, it has one aspect that makes it unique. That is it uses a PIN. This PIN for activation means another person will not know your email or actual telephone number, thereby keeping that part of your data personal. If you accept a PIN invite and then decide you don’t like that person, you can remove them, and that person has not seen any of your other private contact information.
And this is why BBM might survive plus it does have a following. But only time will tell.
BlackBerry BBM is now live on iOS and android.
iOS Appstore link click here.
Play store link. Click here.
The catch is you have to enter your email address and join a queue. No idea how long the queue takes but I will let you know when I get the go ahead.
Update – I had my confirmation email waiting after 6 hours. Accept it seems Blackberrys servers are down due to a temporary server error.
Update 2 – Blackberry announces 5 million downloads of iOS and android app.
Last week I reported The Times Newspaper was pulling its app due to lack of demand. BlackBerry reported that handset sales have been falling due to lack of confidence in the company. Carriers have started to remove BlackBerry from their shelves. And in a recent regulatory filing BlackBerry said the following –
“the intense competition impacting the company’s financial and operational results that previously affected demand in the United States market is now being experienced globally, including in international markets where the company has historically experienced rapid growth.” The company blamed its decline in emerging markets on two old reliable standbys: The rise of super-cheap Android handsets and the lack of key mobile apps for its own BlackBerry 10 platform”
In fact BlackBerry cancelled its earnings call, saying it did not need to do one.
Says it all really. Sad times.
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s The Times newspaper said on Tuesday it would no longer make its mobile app available on a Blackberry because few people used it, in another sign that rival smartphone makers are trumping its technology.
This is not good news for BlackBerry. Let’s hope there is some future for the once market leading company.
The Canadian smartphone maker has revealed a new direct selling model that it likely hopes will shore up that retail channel loss. BlackBerry now offers unlocked Q10 and Z10 smartphones via its own site, for $549.00 and $449.00 respectively. This is currently a US only offer.
It’s a reasonable idea but not one that will be enough to save it in my opinion.
Blackberry’s has disclosed its second-quarter earnings report after announcing layoffs for 4,500 employees.
Revenue for the quarter was $1.6 billion, as BlackBerry had indicated it would be in last week’s guidance. However, it suffered an adjusted loss from continuing operations of $248 million, or 47 cents a share, which was on the low side of the 47 cent-to-51 cent range that Blackberry had warned of last week. Wall Street Analysts had been expecting, on average, a lost of 49 cents a share.
However, it’s revenue was dampened by a loss on the Z10 of $935m.
I don’t won’t to sound pessimistic but it is going to take a miracle for the company to come back from this.
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