BlackBerry today unleashed a near-unfathomably bad third quarter financial report. The company reported a $4.4 billion loss and a 56% year-over-year decline in revenue.
This dismal quarterly was expected after the taste investors got from BlackBerry’s nearly $1 billion second-quarter loss. John Chen, BlackBerry’s new interim CEO, has also made it clear that he will be making sweeping changes to the company, including a renewed focus on enterprise mobility services for revenue.
As part of these changes BlackBerry announced today that it has entered into a five-year with Foxconn to develop and manufacture BlackBerry hardware. Foxconn is the largest tech manufacturer in the world, having gained that position due to its role as the primary manufacturer of Apple products, including the iPhone.
BlackBerry stated that the first device that will be a part of the deal will be an smartphone for Indonesia and “other fast-growing markets.” This implies that BlackBerry is looking to produce low-cost smartphones to compete in emerging markets where industry watchers believe most industry growth will come from over the next few years. BlackBerry is targeting “early 2014” for this Indonesian device’s launch.
“This partnership demonstrates BlackBerry’s commitment to the device market for the long-term and our determination to remain the innovation leader in secure end-to-end mobile solutions,” said Chen. “Partnering with Foxconn allows BlackBerry to focus on what we do best – iconic design, world-class security, software development, and enterprise mobility management – while simultaneously addressing fast-growing markets leveraging Foxconn’s scale and efficiency that will allow us to compete more effectively.”