Rivalry forces rapid drop in BlackBerry's fortunes
Source: Agencies |
June 11, 2012, Monday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
US President Barack Obama couldn't bear to part with his BlackBerry. Oprah Winfrey declared it one of her "favorite things." It could be so addictive that it was nicknamed "the CrackBerry."
Then came a new generation of competing smartphones, and suddenly the BlackBerry, that game-changing breakthrough in personal connectedness, looks ancient.
There is even talk that the fate of Research In Motion, the company that fathered the BlackBerry in 1999, is no longer certain as its flagship property rapidly loses market share to flashier phones like Apple's iPhone and Google's Android-driven models.
With over US$2 billion in cash, bankruptcy for RIM seems unlikely in the near term, but these are troubling times for Waterloo, Ontario, the town of 100,000 that was transformed by the BlackBerry into Canada's Silicon Valley.
RIM's US share of the smartphone market shrank from 44 percent in 2009 to 10 percent in 2011 according to market researcher NPD Group. The firm still has 78 million active subscribers across the globe, but last month RIM issued a warning that it will lose money for the second straight quarter, will lay off workers this year, and has hired a team of bankers to help it weigh its options. Last July it cut 2,000 jobs.
Of RIM's 16,500 remaining employees, 7,500 live in Waterloo, a university town 90 minutes' drive from Toronto, where everyone seems to know someone who works for RIM.
John Lind says RIM's impact on his field, commercial real estate, is enormous. "We talk about RIM in hushed tones in this region because no one wants to be negative about it, no one wants to be seen as not on their side," he said. "But people are saying, 'What would this region look like without RIM?'"
The decline of the BlackBerry has come shockingly fast. RIM's software is still focused on e-mail, and is less user-friendly and agile than iPhone or Android. Its attempt at touch screens was a flop, and it lacks the apps that power other smartphones.
RIM was once Canada's most valuable company with a market value of US$83 billion in June 2008, but the stock has plummeted since, from over US$140 share to around US$10.
Its decline is evoking memories of Nortel, another Canadian tech giant, which ended up declaring bankruptcy in 2009.
"It has to be very sad," BGC Financial Partners analyst Colin Gillis said. "I feel for those people up there because what else are you going to do? work at the Apple store that just opened in the mall?"
Then came a new generation of competing smartphones, and suddenly the BlackBerry, that game-changing breakthrough in personal connectedness, looks ancient.
There is even talk that the fate of Research In Motion, the company that fathered the BlackBerry in 1999, is no longer certain as its flagship property rapidly loses market share to flashier phones like Apple's iPhone and Google's Android-driven models.
With over US$2 billion in cash, bankruptcy for RIM seems unlikely in the near term, but these are troubling times for Waterloo, Ontario, the town of 100,000 that was transformed by the BlackBerry into Canada's Silicon Valley.
RIM's US share of the smartphone market shrank from 44 percent in 2009 to 10 percent in 2011 according to market researcher NPD Group. The firm still has 78 million active subscribers across the globe, but last month RIM issued a warning that it will lose money for the second straight quarter, will lay off workers this year, and has hired a team of bankers to help it weigh its options. Last July it cut 2,000 jobs.
Of RIM's 16,500 remaining employees, 7,500 live in Waterloo, a university town 90 minutes' drive from Toronto, where everyone seems to know someone who works for RIM.
John Lind says RIM's impact on his field, commercial real estate, is enormous. "We talk about RIM in hushed tones in this region because no one wants to be negative about it, no one wants to be seen as not on their side," he said. "But people are saying, 'What would this region look like without RIM?'"
The decline of the BlackBerry has come shockingly fast. RIM's software is still focused on e-mail, and is less user-friendly and agile than iPhone or Android. Its attempt at touch screens was a flop, and it lacks the apps that power other smartphones.
RIM was once Canada's most valuable company with a market value of US$83 billion in June 2008, but the stock has plummeted since, from over US$140 share to around US$10.
Its decline is evoking memories of Nortel, another Canadian tech giant, which ended up declaring bankruptcy in 2009.
"It has to be very sad," BGC Financial Partners analyst Colin Gillis said. "I feel for those people up there because what else are you going to do? work at the Apple store that just opened in the mall?"
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