BlackBerry hopes new system will be saviour

BlackBerry homescreen. Photo: supplied

BlackBerry homescreen. Photo: supplied

Published Nov 23, 2012

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Asha Speckman

ELSEWHERE the technology has been dubbed the messiah or the saving grace for Research in Motion’s (RIM’s) BlackBerry brand but there is still a greater challenge ahead when the new BlackBerry 10 operating system is launched in January, according to a local analyst.

That test will be to woo smartphone users back to the once popular iconic brand that is almost as renowned for its proprietary operating platform as it is for its dismal loss of market share to Apple iPhones and to Android-operated devices offered by Samsung and more recently Nokia.

It is a big task for consumers to trust the brand but parent company RIM is more than confident that it now has the right ingredients to succeed.

“For us, we have every aspiration to regain share in the aspirational iconic category of the smartphone market and BlackBerry 10 will deliver on that promise,” said Rory O’Neill, the vice-president of marketing for RIM’s Europe, Middle East and Africa region. He was in Johannesburg this week in preparation for the synchronised global launch on January 30.

BlackBerry has returned to the drawing board and reconceptualised the nostalgic elements of the BlackBerry experience. The strategy is clear: to pursue and play to the panderings of the so-called hyperconnected user.

“They have more friends and colleagues in their network. They are constantly having conversations. Communications is very important to them. They have conversations in multiple places: e-mail, work and private e-mail.

“They are on social networks Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter and they are constantly watching these conversations take place,” O’Neill explained on Wednesday.

“They are not just watching competition they are acting on the competition. Sure it can be a small business or entrepreneur that is connecting with customers or his employees but it’s just as likely to be a teenager whose parents are away for the weekend and who is trying to organise a party and doing it all online,” he added.

These people use purpose-driven applications and constantly multi-task between applications such as calendar, social networks, and web browser.

O’Neill said this insight was gleaned from research conducted during the first quarter.

RIM has sold more than 190 million BlackBerry smartphones worldwide but only has about 80 million active subscribers. It has sold more than 1 million BlackBerry PlayBook tablets to date.

To add perspective, last month the International Data Corporation reported that Samsung led third-quarter sales by shipping 56.3 million units, giving it a 31.3 percent market share during the period. Apple followed with 26.9 million iPhone handsets and a 15 percent market share, compared with 13.8 percent for the third quarter last year.

RIM was third with 7.7 million units shipped and 4.3 percent market share, which was a 34.7 percent decline year on year.

BlackBerry 10 has improved the brand offering. The first available model will be a touchscreen device but key differentiators include the concepts of BlackBerry Flow, BlackBerry Hub and BlackBerry Balance.

BlackBerry Flow allows the user seamless navigation to check on various functions at any time without having to exit an application such as a messenger chat. BlackBerry Hub provides a summary of recent social network feeds, SMSes and missed calls, while BlackBerry Balance enables the user to keep a corporate profile and personal profile on one device but each in a separate container.

For example, corporate administrators can lock the user’s corporate profile so that sensitive information cannot be copied and disseminated by SMS.

The keyboard, built into the screen, simulates a physical keyboard and the predictive algorithms and heat mark technology are other differentiators.

Another BlackBerry 10 nugget is the ability for a user to edit a photo and, for example, open closed eyes in the image.

Arthur Goldstuck, the managing director of technology advisory company World Wide Worx, said while the system was “dazzling” and had caught up with competitors “the question that remains now is how appealing the handsets will be”.

He said RIM had not clarified how the service would work with RIM’s special internet service, for which data prices were capped and which had kept the brand’s market share high throughout the developing world.

Goldstuck’s firm said South Africa had 4.8 million BlackBerry users by August.

“In the US BlackBerry has a massive job to do to convince the market, which [gained] the perception of a phone not giving the consumer what it wants.”

O’Neill said the company was not yet occupying itself with market share concerns but with its greatest priorities, which might also be its biggest challenges: attaining a quality experience and marketing.

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