NEW YORK — The struggling company BlackBerry, formerly Research in Motion Ltd., offered hundreds of free devices at an event in Manhattan Wednesday to launch its long-delayed revamped smartphone. The crowd cheerfully accepted — a good omen given how BlackBerry lately couldn’t seem to give its phones away.
Better yet, the phones are worth paying for. Using an overhauled operating system, the Z10 touchscreen phone is a smart, snappy little marvel that ought to put BlackBerry right back at the leading edge of the industry.
Comments
I've been using a BlackBerry Bold for the last 18 months and have been happy with it. The company has sent me numerous emails touting this new phone. But according to the article's summary box, it's only available through Verizon. I have T-Mobile. Thanks, RIM.
It's not so much that RIM doesn't make a phone suitable for T-Mobile, AT&T, or Sprint, rather, it is that those carriers have opted to wait and see if RIM still crashes and burns. Sprint is also playing 'wait and see' with the Microsoft phone. As a Sprint user, I also cannot get this new phone, but I am not eligible to upgrade yet. I am also happy with my BlackBerry, and am inclined to cut it some slack on apps, which for the most part are toys, because it works very well as a phone and email device. Sprint has dropped hints that they are likely to carry it, but not at time of launch.
"But it could prove devastating for Microsoft, which had counted on defectors from BlackBerry to bolster its phone sales." This *may* have been true if it came out 6 months ago. But Microsoft beat them to the punch, and Windows Phone 8 is starting to pick up momentum while the BlackBerry is just in the hands of reviewers, not all of whom liked it as much (see Mossberg in the WSJ.)
Very few companies these days get a second chance. Blackberry (nee RIM) is not one of them. While the company was working out its problems, users and major corporations and federal entities made the switch. Now they're asking users to come back...and they won't. Blackberry just doesn't offer enough in its hardware and software to entice users to ditch an iPhone or Samsung device and come back.
Existing hard-core Blackberry users will carry on, but the company needs to grow the business to survive - and it won't happen. I see the company being bought by someone else within 18 months. They'll be right behind Nokia.
There's a lot more to the Blackberry than just the phone. Companies will look hard all the required infrastructure they have to maintain. To wit: http://www.enterprisecioforum.com/en/blogs/bhaines0/journey-byod-and-end-bes-us-anyway