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The fortunes of Research in Motion continue to hit new lows, as BlackBerry devices are now accounting for just 6 per cent of new phones sold in the lucrative American market over the past three months. This is a significant fall from 11 per cent market share that BlackBerry devices enjoyed earlier. During the same period the sale of Apple handsets have gone up from 10 per cent to 17 per cent. New data from Nielsen indicates that while the usage of smartphones is growing, BlackBerry is not contributing significantly.
There was a time when it was fashionable to refer BlackBerry as CrackBerry, or the addictive device. It was thought to be a must-have for not just professional elites, but also for politicians, celebrities and the like. But ever since the iPhones appeared on the horizon, the BlackBerry devices have started seeming somewhat dated. Many analysts are of the opinion that Apple and the Android powered devices are now leading the new growth in the smartphone market.
On June 17, RIM had announced layoffs in the wake of worse than expected quarterly profits, and that led to a frantic selling activity in BlackBerryss shares, whose price tumbled to make new lows. The problem analysts say is mainly due to the business model that BlackBerry originally practised. It originally sold handsets only to business users, touting its ease of integration with existing in-house corporate computer systems. So corporates bought them by thousands, but individual customers were hardly targeted.
Apple and Android target individual customers. The smartphone market has turned more democratic; in the sense that now it is the individual users and not the corporates who are taking the buying decision. Now that employees have also started pressurizing their companies to allow them to use the latest touchscreen devices, BlackBerry faces the serious risk of losing its loyal base of corporate professionals. When compared with the large colourful screens, with a multitude of feature rich apps, that are the hallmark of iPhone, the BlackBerry arsenal of apps is rather muted.
Its been quite some time since RIM came out with a really path breaking model. This could be taken as an indication of the fact that the company has become complacent at the top. A letter, purportedly by an anonymous BlackBerry employee is currently doing rounds of the Internet. The letter alleges that the companys corporate culture was preventing it from achieving significant successes in the market place. It is certainly time for RIM to tighten its belt and come up with an awesome launch, one that will have the effect of reviving its fortunes.
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