Nearpoints

Craig Mathias

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Singing the BlackBerry Blues

Say it ain’t so – the company that practically personified mobility during the technology’s formative years isn’t getting much respect these days. Can RIM put the bloom back on the ‘Berry?

By Craig Mathias on Thu, 05/05/11 - 8:05pm.

. What's this?

Research in Motion was the first real breakout firm as mobility began to take hold in the late '90's; the company was building successful PDA-form-factor handsets really before anyone else. The legendary pre-BlackBerry 857 and 957 come to mind here; I owned one of the latter and even used its crappy text-based browser to make a purchase from CDNOW while sitting in the audience of a conference session where one of the speakers had just said it would be a long time before someone would be able to use a mobile device to do just that. This is key: RIM knew where we going. There were no issues with vision, at least with regard to mobile e-mail, still a workhorse application today. And RIM became without question the corporate standard for mobility once their product line morphed into the BlackBerry, this more the result of BlackBerry Enterprise Server and over-the-air encryption than user interface or coolness beyond the I've-got-one effect. Simply put: as I've stated before, BlackBerry was a verb before Google was.

But all is no longer well in BlackBerry land. The iPhone and Android are grabbing both headlines and mindshare as well as market share. The once-mighty BlackBerry system seems clunky, slow, and dated. The browser still isn't anything to write home about. The new PlayBook tablet hasn't exactly received stellar reviews, although I personally believe that it will be competitive with future software releases. And the trend towards personal liability (a/k/a BYOD) doesn't exactly bode well for the firm - after all, consumers, despite some market emphasis over the past two years or so, are only a secondary target market for BlackBerry anyway, and they're not exactly clamoring for BlackBerrys at the dealers. And BES is no longer the only way to connect mobile users with enterprise resources. It would appear that RIM is in some degree of trouble here.

And yet I, still not a BlackBerry user, think the firm will emerge from all this is very good shape. Why? Well, the company is in fact trying. Inadequacies in the PlayBook, like a lack of native e-mail support, are already being addressed, and the handset line continues to evolve. An OS transition is underway. RIM was the first handset vendor to establish a workable app strategy (via Java), and they could easily build on this. And I really believe RIM is capable of building handsets the equal of any others anywhere - and, speaking of anywhere, a global expansion in distribution is underway, bringing BlackBerrys to users in emerging economies who likely do not have a strong predilection towards the competition.

And, most importantly, RIM has a huge installed base and an excellent reputation. These guys aren't rank amateurs; they just, like so many others (um, Microsoft and Nokia, just for starters), underestimated the standard that the iPhone would set. But they're in with the operators. They're still the choice at many enterprises. And they'll remain strong where personal liability is rejected for a variety of reasons, most often security. Sure, management needs to get its head right on what's reality today; for example, competitive announcements are publicly discounted much too easily making RIM look cavalier and out-of-touch. A little paranoia is a good thing, and taking new competitors, like Apple, even with no real experience in a new market, like handsets, seriously, is no sign of weakness. Failing to respond is.

So, OK, agreed, RIM is damaged - but this is nothing that other large players over the years haven't had to deal with (Cisco comes to mind). One gets tough. One gets mean. One gets going. RIM, I think, can do this. Sure, they've got only a finite amount of time here, but my money (only figuratively, though) is on them. My previous prediction still stands: they'll remain a top player in handsets and #3 in platforms for the next few years. And beyond that, as history continually shows, it's anyone's game.