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Tag: RIM

  • Apple Hits 65% of the Smartphone Market as RIM Continues to Sink

    Net Market Share, a market share analytics site run by the analytics company Net Applications, today released the results of its June 2012 market share research for mobile and tablet operating systems. From the looks of things, Apple is still on the rise with no signs of slowing down, while Research in Motion (RIM) is continuing to sink towards its demise.

    Apple’s iOS reached an all-time high last month, capturing over 65% of the mobile OS market. This demonstrates just how dominant Apple has been in this space since launching the iPhone only five years ago.

    Though Apple gained over 2% more of the market than it had in May, Google’s Android platform wasn’t where it came from. Android’s thousands of daily activations helped the platform continue its gradual market share increase with a tiny rise to 19.73% in June.

    RIM was definitely the loser of the past month, as its BlackBerry OS platform fell below 2% in June. This is no surprise, as RIM has been hemorrhaging market share to Apple and Android for months, even when the metrics are presented in terms of mobile ad impressions or the absolute number of phones each platform runs on. RIM failed to innovate when the iPhone made its debut, and underestimated the threat that Apple posed to its dominant position in the business smartphone market. The company has finally gotten the message on what consumers want and has designed the BlackBerry 10, but it might be too late. In its recent earnings report it was announced that the BlackBerry 10 has been delayed from its fall 2012 release date to the 1st quarter of 2013. This was the same earnings report that showed RIM’s revenue down 33% from the previous quarter. Obviously, it’s not a sure thing that RIM will survive long enough to launch the BlackBerry 10.

    Oracle’s Java Micro Edition platform, which runs mainly on less expensive feature phones, also dropped slightly, suggesting that more users than ever are upgrading to iPhones, and smartphones in general.

    Take a look at the Net Market Share graph below, and click the button on the top-left of the graph to see how the mobile market has evolved over the last five years:

  • Apparently, Steve Jobs Killed RIM with an Apple Crack Pipe and a Drive-By

    Confirming widespread expectations of a bleak earnings report, BlackBerry makers Research in Motion released their Q1 financials last Thursday. The really bad news came mainly in two announcements. Financially, RIM reported a net GAAP loss of $518 on $2.8 billion in revenues. RIM also announced that the launch of BlackBerry 10 is being pushed to 2013.

    In short, it was just a terrible report from RIM. Couple these new setbacks with the fact that they also reported down in Q4 2011, and just made some substantial job cuts, and you see why it’s do or die time for the company.

    Although the biggest cause of RIM’s steep decline can be argued, the fact remains that they have fallen. Big time. And according to NMA, it’s basically Steve Jobs’ fault.

    You remember NMA, right? The Taiwanese company that’s been animating the world’s biggest news stories for a couple of years? Next Media Animation is no stranger to giving their oftentimes hallucinatory take on tech news – and they happen to love involving Steve Jobs in their animations, whenever relevant.

    Well, today they tackle the RIM collapse, and according to them it’s Apple’s cofounder that takes most of the blame. Just how does Steve Jobs kill BlackBerry? In the same way the any gangster roots out a competing interest – hook their customers on your product and then gank their ass in a drive-by.

    Check out gangster Steve Jobs below:

  • RIM’s Q1 2013 Financials and Delay of Blackberry Ten

    Research in Motion just released their first quarter fiscal 2013 results for the three month period ending June 2nd. As you might have expected, the news is not great and it truly reflects their struggle to stay afloat in the extremely competitive smartphone marketplace.

    The big news from the release is the push back of the BlackBerry 10 release. While we have been patiently expecting the first BlackBerry 10 device to roll out sometime before the holidays, they are now saying we won’t see anything until somewhere in the first three months of 2013.

    Thorsten Heins, President and CEO of Research in Motion comments on the BlackBerry 10 release date:

    “RIM’s development teams are relentlessly focussed on ensuring the quality and reliability of the platform and I will not compromise the product by delivering it before it is ready. I am confident that the first BlackBerry 10 smartphones will provide a ground-breaking next generation smartphone user experience,”

    “We are encouraged by the traction that the BlackBerry 10 platform is gaining with application developers and content partners following the successful BlackBerry Jam sessions that we have held around the world since the beginning of May. Similarly, the reception of the BlackBerry 10 platform by our key carrier partners has been very positive and they are looking forward to going to market with BlackBerry 10 smartphones in the first quarter of calendar 2013.”

    First Quarter Fiscal 2013 Highlights:

    * Cash, cash equivalents, short-term and long-term investments increased to $2.2 billion at the end of the first quarter

    * Cash flow from operations was approximately $710 million in the first quarter

    * Revenue of $2.8 billion in Q1, down 33% from $4.2 billion in the prior quarter

    * GAAP net loss in Q1 of $518 million or $0.99 per share diluted; adjusted net loss of $192 million or $0.37 per share diluted

    * Shipments of BlackBerry smartphones were 7.8 million and shipments of BlackBerry PlayBook tablets were approximately 260,000

    * BlackBerry 10 smartphone launch now scheduled for Q1 of calendar 2013

    * Restructuring efforts underway that will include a workforce reduction of approximately 5,000 employees as part of RIM’s efforts to realize over $1 billion in cost savings, based on RIM’s Q4 FY2012 run rate

    * Launched World Tour BlackBerry Jam developer sessions in 23 countries resulting in strong adoption and support by application and developer partners for BlackBerry 10 platform

    * BlackBerry App World continues to grow with over 89,000 applications available

    * The overall BlackBerry subscriber base continued to grow, and the subscriber base grew in all regions except for North America

    * RIM names Steve Zipperstein, former General Counsel of Verizon Wireless, as Chief Legal Officer

    Thorsten Heins, President and CEO of Research in Motion comments on the financial results of the quarter:

    “Our first quarter results reflect the market challenges I have outlined since my appointment as CEO at the end of January. I am not satisfied with these results and continue to work aggressively with all areas of the organization and the Board to implement meaningful changes to address the challenges, including a thoughtful realignment of resources and honing focus within the Company on areas that have the greatest opportunities,”

    “Our top priority going forward is the successful launch of our first BlackBerry 10 device, which we now anticipate will occur in the first quarter of calendar 2013. In parallel with the roll out of BlackBerry 10, we are aggressively working with our advisors on our strategic review and are actively evaluating ways to better leverage our assets and build on our strengths, including our growing BlackBerry subscriber base of approximately 78 million, our large enterprise installed base, our unique network architecture and our industry leading security capabilities.”

    First Quarter Fiscal 2013 Results:

    Revenue for the first quarter of fiscal 2013 was $2.8 billion, down 33% from $4.2 billion in the previous quarter and down 43% from $4.9 billion in the same quarter of fiscal 2012. The revenue breakdown for the quarter was approximately 59% for hardware, 36% for service and 5% for software and other revenue. During the quarter, RIM shipped 7.8 million BlackBerry smartphones and approximately 260,000 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets.

    GAAP net loss for the quarter was $518 million, or $0.99 per share diluted, compared with a GAAP net loss of $125 million, or $0.24 per share diluted, in the prior quarter and GAAP net income of $695 million, or $1.33 per share diluted, in the same quarter last year.

    Adjusted net loss for the first quarter was $192 million, or $0.37 per share diluted. Adjusted net loss and adjusted diluted loss per share exclude the impact of pre-tax charges of $335 million ($326 million on an after tax basis), which are predominantly non-cash related to the impairment of goodwill.

    So obviously, things don’t look that great and I think many were counting on BlackBerry 10 to come and save RIM, but it looks like they will have to hang in there a little longer. Hopefully the huge cuts they are making to their workforce and manufacturing capabilities will be enough to keep them afloat. We’ll keep you up to dat on BlackBerry 10 and RIM’s longevity.

  • RIM’s Earnings Report Expected To Be Bleak

    RIM’s Earnings Report Expected To Be Bleak

    Research in Motion, makers of the once-might BlackBerry smartphone platform, has found itself in an increasingly bad situation over the last few years. Poor product performance and a string of bad business decisions – including failing to take the threat posed by the iPhone and Android seriously – have left RIM in dire straights. What’s more, it doesn’t look like anything will be improving any time soon. In fact, they may be about to get worse.

    RIM is scheduled to release their earnings report for the first quarter of the 2012 fiscal year this afternoon, and by all accounts there isn’t likely to be any good news. Last quarter RIM reported a significant drop in profits. Today, they’re expected to report significant operating losses for this quarter.

    While there has in the past been some hope that a successful launch of the BlackBerry 10 platform could turn the struggling company around, that’s looking less and less likely. In fact, there’s cause for speculation about whether RIM will ever get BlackBerry 10 off the ground at all. According to recent reports, the company is considering splitting up its handset and software businesses, selling off the handset business, and licensing software like BlackBerry Messenger.

    RIM’s stock price and market cap have been in steady decline for several months now. As of right now, RIM’s stock is trading at $9.11 per share with a market value of $4.82 billion. If this afternoon’s earnings report goes as poorly as expected, you can bet that that number will be going down even further.

  • Spotify Polishes The Brass On RIM’s Titanic

    With everyone speculating about the outcome of Apple’s WWDC, watching Samsung’s Galaxy S III succeed, and awaiting Google I/O this week, it would be fairly easy to over look the fact that Spotify has been officially released for Blackberry.

    The app, which is available for BlackBerry phones from 8520 and up, is a cloud music player that operates on a freemium model. Users can listen to nearly any music they want, though ads will also play on their music stream. An Unlimited or Premium subscription is required to eliminate the ads and raise the cap on how much music can be streamed. Spotify for BlackBerry can be downloaded for free through BlackBerry App World.

    While this is good news for Spotify fans on BlackBerry phones, it seems that niche demographic might soon become extinct. Research In Motion (RIM), the company that designs and manufactures BlackBerry phones, is on the brink of financial chaos. Last week, RIM let thousands more employees go to keep their financial position afloat.

    Today, RIM’s stock is nosediving due to a downgrade from Morgan Stanley. Bloomberg reports that a Morgan Stanley analyst said, “The only way RIM remains a viable entity is at a fraction of its current size, a transformation that erases much of its earnings power.” This is taking into account that the stock has been sliding downward for over a year, from a high of around $70 to its current $9.

    RIM is currently set to release its new smartphone, the BlackBerry 10, sometime this fall. From the previews of the device that have been shown, it’s clear that RIM has finally gotten the message that their old designs will no longer cut it. It’s too late, though. Apple is still gaining market share, as is Android, all at the expense of RIM. If there is a slot for a third competitor in the smartphone market, Microsoft might be able to force its way in with strong Windows Phone 8 integration into its new Windows 8 ecosystem. It’s also a possibility that Samsung might break off from Android and make itself the #1 competitor to Apple.

    The talk today isn’t whether RIM can regain its footing, its about whether the company should split its hardware and software divisions before its inevitable sale. Even if the company manages to actually release the BlackBerry 10, and even if that smartphone has Spotify, it isn’t going to save RIM.

  • RIM To Be Split Up And Sold Off In Pieces?

    BlackBerry maker Research In Motion may be looking to split itself up and sell off some, if not all, of the pieces. The company would divide into at least two divisions – handsets and software services (i.e., BlackBerry Messenger). The handset business would be the first on the block. RIM could then license the BlackBerry Messenger service to other companies, or sell it as well.

    This news comes The Sunday Times via The Verge. According to the Times, Facebook and Amazon are both possible buyers for RIM’s hardware division. They also say that this is one of the options drawn up by the financial advisors hired by the company to help it navigate through its current struggles. They expect RIM’s final plan to be unveiled sometime this summer.

    Despite once occupying a seemingly unassailable position at the top of the smartphone market, RIM’s situation has gotten consistently worse over the last few years. The company never managed to adequately respond to the threat Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android platform posed to its business. A series of failed products and bad business moves caused RIM to hemorrhage market share to its rivals. In January co-founders and co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie were replaced by Thorsten Heins. In March, though, their fourth quarter earnings report revealed little good news – revenues down 25% from the previous quarter and 7% for the year. Earlier this month the company’s stock hit a nearly ten-year low.

    All in all, these are not happy days for the once-mighty RIM. While there may be some hope left in the upcoming BlackBerry 10 release (assuming it actually happens), it’s looking more and more like RIM as we’ve known it won’t be around this time next year.

  • BlackBerry 10 Won’t Have a Physical Keyboard

    While RIM’s newest version of the BlackBerry won’t be ready until sometime later this year, they have confirmed that BlackBerry 10 won’t actually have a physical keyboard.

    While versions of the BlackBerry 10 operating systems will be available on devices with a physical keyboard at a later date, RIM spokesperson Rebecca Freiburger verified it is not part of the design right now.

    Actual details about the device itself are in short supply, there are many articles floating around by people who got a chance to sample the BlackBerry 10 software, and there is a consensus that it’s pretty nice.

    Take a look:

    There is a rumor floating around that RIM may release the first BlackBerry 10 devices sometime in October, but it has not been confirmed. It certainly seems like sooner would be better than later, at least for RIM.

    Just yesterday, we reported that RIM is downsizing departments by the dozen. The company is hoping to lean out their operations and reorganize in order to continue to compete in the consumer market.

    In April, after some substantial loses reported in their quarterly earnings, they experienced even more bad news as several top executives abandoned their positions at the company.

    Hopefully BlackBerry 10 will make it to the market before the company experiences any more major set back. Even then, it’s hard to say if RIM’s latest offering will be enough for them to stay competitive against the Androids and iOS’s of the world. We’ll keep you posted on any further BlackBerry 10 updates.

  • RIM Trims the Fat with Substantial Job Cuts as they Struggle to Stay in Business

    Research in Motion (RIM) has been struggling for awhile, and has definitely lost its foothold in the marketplace giving way to increasingly popular iOS and Android devices.

    While their BlackBerry line was once considered an enterprise communication standard, they are now struggling just to stay in business.

    The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday, that RIM has already been proactive in cutting their workforce in order to reduce costs and make way for a much need reorganization of operations.

    The cuts are being made in the quality controls department, parts, and operations. According to inside sources, the layoffs have been taking place in batches of up to ten employees at a time. RIM also saw the resignation of many top executives in early April, just after they announced a less than stellar quarterly earnings report.

    The latest job cuts come after reducing their workforce by over 2000 people just before the beginning of 2012. In March, they still employed over 16,000 people, but it is unclear where that number stands after this last round of layoffs.

    Despite the challenges the company faces, they insist they are not abandoning the consumer market, and they plan to introduce a newly redesigned BlackBerry by the end of this year.

    So, while the fate of BlackBerry and RIM hangs in the balance, they continue to struggle and lose employees left and right. Hopefully we’ll see something come out of these job cuts and RIM will emerge as a leaner, meaner business machine.

    There’s definitely room for more competition on the smartphone and device marketplace, but the question is, does RIM have what it takes to deliver where others can’t? We’ll keep you updated as RIM struggles to reorganize and reduce their overhead.

  • Former AT&T Employee Pleads Guilty To Insider Trading

    Former AT&T Employee Pleads Guilty To Insider Trading

    A former employee of AT&T has confessed to participating in a network of experts who obtained corporate secrets and passed them along to investors.

    According to a report this afternoon from Reuters, Alnoor Ebrahim plead guilty to a single count of conspiracy to commit wire and securities fraud. In exchange for his guilty plea, prosecutors requested that he be sentenced to not more than two years in prison.

    According to his statement, Ebrahim, who is a Tanzanian-born American citizen, admitted to passing along information concerning AT&T’s iPhone and BlackBerry sales figures to hedge fund managers. He was identified by another member of the network, James Fleishman, who was a sales manager in Silicon Valley.

    Ebrahim has been fired from AT&T.

  • BlackBerry Manufacturer Celestica To Wind Down Production As RIM Reorganizes

    Celestica, one of the main manufacturing partners responsible for Research In Motion’s BlackBerry devices, has announced that they will wind down production of the devices by the end of the year. The changes are coming as the struggling RIM is in the midst of changing its focus and supply chain strategy.

    Toronto-based Celestica has been one of the primary makers of BlackBerry products for several years. The wind down process is expected to take 3-6 months. The company said that it will make more details available during its second quarter earnings call, which is scheduled for July 27th.

    RIM, once the undisputed king of the smartphone hill, has been struggling severely over the last few years. Back in March they released their earnings report for the fourth quarter of the 2011 fiscal year, and the news was pretty bad. Revenue was down 7% for the year, and 25% for the quarter. As part of that report they announced the departure of several executives (who were followed by more later).

    They also announced changes to their strategy for the BlackBerry line. Moving forward, they plan to focus more exclusively business customers rather than the average consumer. This led many to conclude that they were abandoning the consumer market altogether. RIM denied this, insisting that they were actually focusing on a very particular segment of the consumer market – business people who supply their own devices for work.

    At any rate, it appears that this refocusing of RIM’s attention with the BlackBerry will mean fewer devices being made. It also means that businesses that depend on RIM for their revenues should start considering other sources of income, just in case.

  • RIM’s Former CEOs Get $12 Million Payout For Leaving

    Back in January Research In Motion – the struggling makers of the BlackBerry smartphone platform – appointed Thorsten Heins as the company’s new president and CEO. Heins replaced former co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis. As part of that succession plan – reportedly proposed by Balsillie and Lazaridis themselves – Balsillie retained a seat on RIM’s board while Lazaridis became the vice-chair.

    The move wasn’t enough to save the struggling company, though, and in March they released a dismal quarterly earnings report, and announced the departure of several top executives. Among them was Balsillie, who surrendered his place on RIM’s board of directors. Even so, RIM’s problems have continued, with the company’s stock hitting an almost ten-year low earlier this month.

    Now it seems that the struggles of the company they founded were not sufficient incentive for Balsillie and Lazaridis to step down from their posts as co-CEO. According to a form 6-K document filed with the SEC earlier this week, the two were given a combined total of nearly $12 million as compensation for their departure.

    According to the document, Lazaridis will continue to serve as vice-chair of RIM’s board, while he and Balsillie will receive a variety of compensations for their work as RIM’s co-founders and co-CEOs. The total value of Balsillie’s severance comes to $7,929,229, while Lazaridis’s comes to $3,956,056, for a total of $11,885,355. The document also provides RIM’s reasoning for so handsomely rewarding its co-founders:

    Messrs. Lazaridis and Balsillie revolutionized the worldwide wireless industry with the introduction of the BlackBerry and forever changed how the world communicates. Under their leadership, the Company successfully navigated many challenges and quickly scaled to become a global company and industry leader with sales in over 175 countries and more than 17,000 employees worldwide. Over the last decade, the Company experienced tremendous growth, with annual revenues increasing from $294 million to just under $20 billion. Messrs. Lazaridis and Balsillie have also received many awards outside of the Company in recognition of their success and contributions to the Company, the broader mobile industry and Canadian business. These factors were taken into consideration by the Board in entering into the transition agreements. In addition, the transition agreements were entered into in recognition of Messrs. Lazaridis’ and Balsillie’s years of dedicated service and leadership as founders, Co-CEOs and Co-Chairs of the Company.

    Interestingly, the transition agreements do not appear to have taken into account their role in the company’s current (dire) situation. While it’s absolutely true that RIM “forever changed how the world communicates,” it’s also true that RIM’s response to the rise of the consumer smartphone – i.e., the iPhone and Android – was consistently poor. The iPhone’s initial success and popularity was met with a mixture of scorn and smugness born of absolute conviction that the BlackBerry’s position at the top of the market was unassailable. Once RIM recognized its competition as a credible threat, its responses were a string of too-little-too-late devices that simply failed to measure up to what the iOS and Android platforms had to offer. While Balsillie and Lazaridis are absolutely deserving of recognition for how high RIM had climbed by 2007, they deserve just as much blame for how far RIM has fallen since then.

  • RIM Pulls Plug On 16GB BlackBerry PlayBook

    BlackBerry maker Research In Motion appears to have discontinued the 16GB version of their PlayBook tablet, according to recent reports. Though nothing is certain yet, it appears that recent price cuts on the PlayBook have drastically reduced the 16GB PlayBook’s profit margins, to the point that RIM is barely making any profits at all from the sale of the device. Given RIM’s current financial woes, they can hardly afford to sell a product on which they turn almost no profit.

    According to Ubergizmo, RIM’s response to a customer email hinted that the PlayBook would be discontinued, though currently remaining stock would continue to be sold off. RIM has confirmed the cancellation earlier today. Here’s their statement:

    RIM will no longer be making the 16 GB model of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. The 16 GB PlayBook will continue to be available for distributors and retailers while quantities last. We continue to remain committed to the tablet space and the 32 GB and 64 GB models of the BlackBerry PlayBook continue to be available from our distributors and retailers around the world.

    We have limited quantities remaining of the 16GB version of the BlackBerry PlayBook, however the 32GB and 64GB are still available and offer great value to our customers.

    The BlackBerry PlayBook hit stores in April 2011. With the iPhone and Android bleeding RIM dry of market share and the iPad having proven to be a mega-hit, RIM needed its own tablet. Unfortunately, the PlayBook’s reception was lukewarm, to put it kindly. Critics savaged the device for its lack of certain features that are regarded as must-haves for any tablet, e.g., standalone email and calendar apps. While the update to PlayBook OS 2.0 earlier this year alleviated some of those problems, PlayBook sales have still proven less than impressive.

    RIM, meanwhile, has been having severe troubles of late. The company’s stock recently hit a near-decade low when it fell below $10 per share.

  • RIM Facing Patent Lawsuit As Stock Woes Continue

    Research In Motion, makers of the once-ubiquitous BlackBerry smartphone, can’t seem to catch a break lately. They continue to hemorrhage market share to iOS and Android, and their stock recently tumbled below the $10 mark for the first time in almost ten years, bringing the company’s market cap to $5.09 billion, just one sixteenth of their value in 2007.

    Now, to add insult to injury, they appear to be facing a patent infringement lawsuit. Mobile Telecommunications Technologies (MTEL) has filed suit against RIM in U.S. District Court in Texas, claiming that RIM has infringed on two of its patents. The patents in question (see here and here) cover mobile telephone call back system involving a mobile phone and a pager, and a system for delivering messages between a system network and mobile units. In addition to being broad, both patents are quite old. They were issued in September and December of 1996 (though one was filed in September of 1994). The complaint, embedded below, accuses RIM of violating MTEL’s patents with the BlackBerry Enterprise Server and BlackBerry Infrastructure.

    Mobile Telecommunications Technologies v. Research in Motion

    It probably goes without saying at this point, but MTEL is pretty clearly a patent troll. What’s interesting about this case, though, is the timing. Any way you slice it, RIM is on the ropes. They’re limping along as best they can, waiting for the BlackBerry 10 launch later this year. If BlackBerry 10 fails to perform, it’s a fair bet that that will be the end of RIM as we know it. So MTEL appears to be striking while the iron is hot, as it were: if they have any chance of squeezing money out of RIM, now is probably their best opportunity. Even so, it’s a pretty slimy move. Patent-trolling a company in RIM’s current state is the epitome of kicking someone when they’re down.

  • RIM’s $10 Stock: Lowest Price in Nearly a Decade

    With the release of the new BlackBerry 10 looming in the distance, Research in Motion (RIM) is struggling to keep its head above water. Shares of the company are presently trading at about $9.70, which is almost the lowest price in a decade. RIM’s market cap is at $5.09 billion or about fifteen times less than it was valued at in 2007.

    This news comes just as RIM’s CEO,Thorsten Heins released a letter letting his shareholders know they would be reporting a loss on their first quarter earnings report. Stiff competition and poor sales have resulted in the company sustaining losses in many areas, and the impact will reach far beyond just this quarter.

    RIM president and CEO, Thorsten Heins comments on the challenges which lie ahead for the company:

    “RIM is going through a significant transformation as we move towards the BlackBerry 10 launch, and our financial performance will continue to be challenging for the next few quarters. The on-going competitive environment is impacting our business in the form of lower volumes and highly competitive pricing dynamics in the marketplace, and we expect our Q1 results to reflect this, and likely result in an operating loss for the quarter.”

    “We are continuing to be aggressive as we compete for our customers’ business – both enterprise and consumer – around the world, and our teams are working hard to provide cost-competitive, feature-rich solutions to our global customer base. On the positive side, we expect to further increase our cash position in Q1 from the approximately $2.1 billion we had at the end of fiscal 2012.”

    “Although we are facing challenges, we remain excited about BlackBerry 10 and believe that this platform coupled with the results of the strategic review will create long-term value for our stakeholders. We will provide another more detailed business update when we report our first quarter results in June.”

    Hopefully BlackBerry 10 will be enough to save RIM’s business, but it certainly doesn’t look good as things stand right now. Industry analyst, Brian Blair of Wedge Partners commented on RIM recently and believes the Government and enterprise movement away from the BlackBerry platform to competitors like iOS and Android will prove to significant for RIM to overcome.

    Brian Blair, analyst for Wedge Partners, comments on the impending decline of RIM’s business:

    “Our view is that the next four quarters show a steep decline in quarterly units and a gradual decline in overall subscribers, which at around 73 million, is the last of the growing, positive metrics for RIM,”

    “We continue to see a mass exodus away from the BlackBerry platform in the consumer segment, in the enterprise, and in government, and there is nothing that will stave off this decline in 2012.”

  • RIM’s Business is in Trouble at BlackBerry 10 Launch

    Research in Motion says their business is in trouble and they expect to incur big losses throughout the rest of 2012. This news comes just as they are about to release BlackBerry 10. On June 2nd, RIM will be revealing their Q1 financial results and they want stockholder’s to be ready for the bad news, but they also want to spearhead a campaign for change to combat the poor financial performance before damage gets out of control.

    RIM president and CEO, Thorsten Heins comments on the challenges which lie ahead for the company:

    “RIM is going through a significant transformation as we move towards the BlackBerry 10 launch, and our financial performance will continue to be challenging for the next few quarters. The on-going competitive environment is impacting our business in the form of lower volumes and highly competitive pricing dynamics in the marketplace, and we expect our Q1 results to reflect this, and likely result in an operating loss for the quarter.”

    “We are continuing to be aggressive as we compete for our customers’ business – both enterprise and consumer – around the world, and our teams are working hard to provide cost-competitive, feature-rich solutions to our global customer base. On the positive side, we expect to further increase our cash position in Q1 from the approximately $2.1 billion we had at the end of fiscal 2012.”

    The company has been making strategic changes to their management team in order to gain a more competitive position in the market. They recently hired Kristian Tear as Chief Operating Officer, who posses a background in international sales from Europe, Asia and Latin America. Frank Boulben will now serve as Chief Marketing Officer and he brings vast experience from the mobile computing and communications industry. The duo will be instrumental in developing the new Blackberry 10 platform and pulling RIM’s business out of the flames.

    RIM will also be cutting jobs throughout 2012 in order to keep operating costs in check. They have hired JP Morgan and RBC to help them identify financial weaknesses at the company. The high churn in the U.S. marketplace threatens their overall livelihood, but they still see many advantages.

    RIM lists these accomplishments as assets to the company:

    * Our annual BlackBerry World conference and BlackBerry 10 Jam took place earlier this month and both were tremendously successful. More than 5,000 developers, partners, carriers and enterprise customers from 115 different countries saw the first glimpses of our next-generation BlackBerry 10 platform and their response was encouraging.

    * Our developer partners have been enthusiastic with the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha prototype unit we distributed at BlackBerry World and many are well underway in developing applications to be ready for the launch of BlackBerry 10 in the latter part of calendar 2012.

    * The support and enthusiasm from our developer community is also reflected in our app growth, where we now feature more than 80,000 apps, which represents a 220% increase from one year ago, and more than 15,000 apps for PlayBook compared to less than 2,000 last year. We believe this bodes well for our ecosystem as we get set to launch BlackBerry 10.

    * We are making steady progress with the innovation of our next-generation BlackBerry 10 mobile computing platform, which is still on track to launch in the latter part of calendar 2012.

    * Our global subscriber base continued to grow this quarter to approximately 78 million, driven primarily by growth in international markets, which is partially offset by high churn in the United States, and our BBM user base has grown to approximately 56 million users globally.

    * Our strong brand internationally was recently enhanced with the successful launch of two new BlackBerry 7 phones in India and Latin America.

    RIM president and CEO, Thorsten Heins once again comments:

    “Although we are facing challenges, we remain excited about BlackBerry 10 and believe that this platform coupled with the results of the strategic review will create long-term value for our stakeholders. We will provide another more detailed business update when we report our first quarter results in June.”

    You’ll be able to find those first quarter financial results here on Webpronews as soon as they are released along with any other news about RIM and the upcoming BlackBerry 10.

  • Android Making Gains Overseas

    Data from Kantar WorldPanel has shown that Google’s Android OS has been making gains in the first quarter in seven major markets, including Australia, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United States.

    In Italy and Spain, Android popularity more than doubled year-over-year in both markets, at 49% and 72% respectively. Germany saw a 62% rise, roughly double. Apple’s iPhone made gains on Android in the U.S. and the UK over the same period, but lost users in Europe. Android still is king in the UK, with over a third of that country’s smartphone users adopting the platform.

    Microsoft’s Windows Phone has doubled its share in Germany at 6 percent, and has risen to roughly a 3-4% market share in France, Italy, the UK and the U.S. Microsoft has also seen a boost in Windows Phone use in emerging markets, having released the platform in 23 new countries in February.

    Android gains have prompted losses in Nokia’s Symbian and the Blackberry platforms. RIM’s market share in the U.S. has dropped from 16% to 12% in the last year. Though, RIM still garners more app downloads than both Android and iOS.

  • RIM Appoints New Operating and Marketing Leadership

    RIM Appoints New Operating and Marketing Leadership

    Research In Motion (RIM) announced today that it has hired a new Chief Operating Officer (COO) and Chief Marketing Officer (CMO). Kristian Tear will take over former COO Jim Roan’s position and Frank Boulben has been named the new CMO. This news comes just a month after a poor earnings report was announced and executives began fleeing the company.

    “Kristian and Frank bring extensive knowledge of the rapidly changing wireless global market and will help RIM as we sharpen our focus on delivering long-term value to our stakeholders,” said RIM President and Chief Executive Officer Thorsten Heins. “Most importantly, both Kristian and Frank possess a keen understanding of the emerging trends in mobile communications and computing.”

    Tear, pictured above, is leaving his position as executive vice president for Sony Mobile Communications to accept the new COO role at RIM. He will oversee operational functions for RIM handhelds and services, including research and development, products, global sales, manufacturing, and supply chain.

    “RIM is an important player in the mobile industry and I am excited to be a part of its future,” said Tear. “I look forward to working with the talented RIM employees and harnessing their ingenuity and creativity for the benefit of more than 77 million BlackBerry users around the world. I also look forward to helping RIM attract a brand new generation of BlackBerry users.”

    Boulben is a former executive vice president of strategy, marketing and sales for LightSquared. Boulben will oversee marketing efforts worldwide. RIM’s marketing efforts could certainly use a clear vision, judging from the recent “Wake Up” debacle in Australia.

    “RIM is a pioneer in the mobile world and the BlackBerry brand is a global icon,” said Boulben. “We all know how fast the mobile arena evolves and with the BlackBerry 10 platform, I believe RIM will once again change the way individuals and enterprises engage with each other and the world around them. I could not resist the opportunity to be part of that transformation.”

    Boulben sounds confident, but it is clear that RIM is in need of a shake-up if it hopes to stop hemorrhaging users and compete with Apple and Samsung in the smartphone market. RIM has been on a downward spiral for a while, and its upcoming Blackberry 10 smartphone, though met with positive reviews, hasn’t turned around industry expectations for the company.

    What do you think? Will these new appointments save RIM from performing large cutbacks and settling into a new defensive position as a software licenser and patent troll? Leave a comment below and let us know.

  • RIM’s “Wake Up” Campaign Reaches A Stirring Anti-Climax

    You may remember the peculiar “WAKE UP” marketing stunt pulled by BlackBerry maker Research In Motion about a week ago in Australia. If not, here’s a quick refresher: a big black bus emblazoned with the phrase “WAKE UP” on the side pulled up outside an Apple Store in Sydney and disgorged a crowd of black-clad protesters who stood outside the store shouting “WAKE UP” and holding black signs that said (you guessed it) “WAKE UP.”

    Initial blame for the stunt – which most agreed was pretty ridiculous – fell on Samsung. After all, Samsung is Apple’s biggest competitor, and has a history of ripping Apple in its commercials. Samsung, however, denied having any part of the stunt. A little more digging pointed a finger at RIM.

    After another day or so of speculation, RIM confirmed that they were, in fact, behind the campaign. They promised that the counter on the Wake Up Australia was leading up to a “reveal” that was designed “to provoke conversation on what ‘being in business’ means to Australians.”

    Well, that counter was set to expire yesterday, May 6th, and RIM’s big “reveal” is now available for your viewing pleasure. What is it, you ask? Is it a new BlackBerry 10 smartphone? The PlayBook 2? Some awesomely impressive business-related service that will bring RIM back from the edge of ruin? Well, if you were to head over to the original Wake Up Australia website today, you would be redirected to a different site: wakeupbebold.com. Once there, a speech given by a man with an Australian accent starts playing and scrolling up your screen. This grand speech, it turns out, is RIM’s big “reveal.” Check it out below:

    WAKE UP

    It’s time to mean business.

    Now before you go looking for your suit and briefcase, we’re not talking about that kind of business.

    Business is no longer just a suit-wearing, cubicle-sitting, card-carrying kind of pursuit.

    These days being ‘in business’ means you’re the kind of person who takes action and makes things happen.

    You don’t just think different… you do different.

    It’s a simple choice:

    You’re either here to leave your mark and eat opportunity for breakfast

    OR

    You’re satisfied to just float through life like a cork in the stream.

    Now, we know some people will choose to float on by and that’s fine.

    Being in business is not for everyone, but unfortunately… there is no middle ground. You’re either in business or you’re not.

    For those of us with our eyes wide open, we need to realise there’s only one device for people who mean business… the brand that’s been in business from the very beginning.

    Wake Up. Be Bold.
    BlackBerry

    Yep. That’s it. Clicking pretty much anywhere on the page after that takes you to BlackBerry’s Australian website. No new products, no major announcements, no persuasive rhetoric about why BlackBerry is better than the iPhone or Android, no actual facts about RIM’s products at all. Just that speech, with it’s not-so-subtle dig at Apple (“You don’t just think different…”), and a link to a BlackBerry website that is almost identical to the one that was up on Friday.

    It’s hard not to be unkind about this whole stunt, because frankly, it’s pretty ridiculous. RIM has sunk unknown thousands of dollars into a PR stunt that is almost guaranteed to accomplish absolutely nothing. RIM’s problem isn’t that people don’t know their products exist, and it isn’t that people don’t associate their products with business. If that were the problem, then this campaign might have helped. RIM’s problem, though, is that the products they make are considered passé and inferior to the iPhone (and Android). That can’t be fixed by a pointless PR stunt. If this had been the lead-up to the launch of the first BlackBerry 10 smartphone, it might have made sense. But it didn’t lead up to anything. It’s just a little spiel about how business-y BlackBerry is. Heck, if they had even linked to a page that talked about why, specifically, BlackBerry was better for business than the iPhone, even that might have been something. But they didn’t do that either.

    Ultimately, it’s hard to imagine that this little gimmick actually accomplished anything at all.

    What do you think of RIM’s Wake Up campaign? Does it make you more interested in using BlackBerry products? What does it accomplish? Let us know in the comments.

  • Nielsen Takes a Look at Smartphone Demographics

    Over at the Nielsenwire blog today, Nielsen highlighted some of the results from its recent Mobile Insights report for the first quarter of 2012. Included is information on how each of the smartphone operating systems are performing and a look at the demographics for smartphone users in the U.S.

    The blog post starts off by stating that more than half of U.S. mobile subscribers now use smartphones: 50.4% as of March 2012. Though it also names Apple as the leading manufacturer of those smartphones, recent reports suggest that Samsung might now be the leader in smartphone sales. Regardless of the manufacturer, Nielsen’s number show that Google’s Android OS has a solid lead in the number of smartphones it runs on, 48.5% compared to Apple’s 32%. These numbers are close to the figures comScore recently released, though comScore shows Android as having more than half of the smartphone market. Both have RIM dwindling to around a 12% share of the market.

    The most interesting portion of the Nielsen blog post was the demographic information about smartphone users. Though the gender breakdown of smartphone users is almost even (50.9 % female), it turns out that minorities are far more likely than white Americans to use smartphones. More Hispanics, African Americans, and Asian Americans use smartphones than use feature phones. More than two-thirds of Asian Americans (67.3%) use smartphones. The percentage of white Americans that use smartphones is less than half, 44.7%. Take a look at the chart, which accompanies the blog post, below.

    Nielsen's chart on smartphone ethnicity, Q1 2012

    What do you think? Is there an underlying cause for the rapid adoption of smartphones by minorities? Leave a comment below and let us know.

    (graph image courtesy Nielsen)

  • Apple, Samsung Take 99% Of Mobile Phone Profits

    There’s been a lot of discussion lately of who the top smartphone maker is. In the previous quarter Samsung became both the top smartphone maker and the top mobile phone maker overall in the previous quarter, all three of the biggest carriers activated more iPhones.

    Ultimately, though, questions of unit sales and market share are secondary. The big question is, simply, who made more money? Samsung may have beaten Apple by just over 7 million unit sales, but which company turned a higher profit? In this, Apple is the winner by a sizable margin. According to a recent study by Asymco, Apple raked in a whopping 73% of all profits in the smartphone market. Samsung came in a distant second with 26%. That, you may notice, leaves a mere 1% for every other smartphone maker to share. As it turns out, though, the other smartphone makers don’t actually share that last 1%. It all goes to HTC. Every other smartphone maker – RIM, Nokia, LG, Motorola, etc. – lost money in the past quarter.

    Smartphone Profit Shares

    While the percentage graph is impressive, it’s also a bit misleading, as it ignores the changes in the amount of available profit in the mobile phone industry. When the fact that profits have grown dramatically over the past few years is factored in, the picture becomes much more remarkable.

    Smartphone Profits

    The first graph could make it seem that Apple (and, to a lesser extent, Samsung) ate away at the profits of their competitors, The second makes it clear that, in a addition to that, Apple also drove massive overall growth in the mobile phone market. When the iPhone came along in 2007, the profits for the entire mobile phone industry (which was dominated by Nokia at the time), were around $4 billion. In the years since the iPhone – and especially since 2010, the mobile phone market’s profits have grown astronomically, due primarily to the iPhone.

  • BlackBerry 10 Camera Lets Users Turn Back Time

    Instead of being excited for the most advanced BlackBerry phone ever revealed, the tech press greeted the BlackBerry 10 with a collective “meh,” and proceeded to speculate as to whether the phone was enough to save the company from death or becoming a full-time patent troll. But among the many announcements in the BlackBerry World 2012 keynote presentation was the demonstration of a remarkable camera feature RIM has been developing for its latest smartphone.

    The feature, demonstrated in the video below, allows users to detect where faces in photos are. Users can then select each face and skip back or forward in time, frame-by-frame, to get the perfect expression for the picture. Each face can be individually adjusted. That this type of “magic moment” software, as RIM has referred to it, hasn’t been seen before is interesting, as the cameras on phones have been able to record video for years now.

    I can’t help but think of it as cheating, though. Photographs are meant to capture a moment in time, and this warps that concept. I know that software such as Adobe’s Photoshop has been able to do similar things for some time, but being able to easily combine several seconds worth of time into one “best” image, and do it without video editing software, is a big change for the average smartphone user. I suppose this is the future of picture taking, though I think we may need a new name for it other than photography. Any suggestions? Leave a comment below and let me know.