BlackBerry 10 Unveiled 185
arcite writes "Research in Motion Ltd's new CEO, Thorsten Heins, unveiled BlackBerry 10 in Florida today. Will new features such as a virtual keyboard that learns from typing behavior and a camera that easily focuses on faces be enough to scrape back precious market share (which could possibly fall to 5%) from the likes of Apple and Android? With no physical device yet revealed and a release date ranging anywhere from August to October, it will be an uphill battle."
Engadget had some brief hands-on time with a dev Alpha. It seems RIM is trying to jumpstart app development through its App Generator and financial incentives.
in other news, Philco has a new audio tube. (Score:3, Insightful)
and the all-new 2013 Tucker will run on air.
RIM is out in the garden at this point with all the other vegetables, and you can write your investment off.
BB is a business phone (Score:2, Insightful)
BB is a business phone, I think any attempt to make it more of a toy can only make matters worse.
Apple and Android are very tough competitors, no point aiming at ousting them.
Business people (if they exist, of course) need a phone which performs the usual basic office tasks, can be used a whole day without the battery dying and easily ties in to the corporate communications suite.
Re:BB is a business phone (Score:5, Insightful)
You must have missed all the news about users opting out of outdated business devices to purchase their own devices and how business is are going nuts over bring your own device initiatives thinking it saves them money.
Also the latest RIM devices are no-longer monochrome devices that last days on a charge, their touch screen units are barely on part with others in the market for battery life.
Re:Shouldn't shareholders demand an asset auction. (Score:4, Insightful)
You could have said the same thing to the Apple shareholder when Mr. Pepsi ran it to the ground.
Re:BB is a business phone (Score:5, Insightful)
Both the iPhone and Android can just as easily be integrated into an existing business environment.
Both can be forced to follow corporate policies.
Both can be remotely wiped if lost or stolen.
Both can connect to Exchange - and I mean a full connection, syncing email, calendar and contacts - without having to buy extra software or hardware (which for years was a pre-requisite to get the best out of Blackberries; I don't know if it still is).
Essentially, RIM's unique selling points were on borrowed time the day ActiveSync was made available for licensing. The only amazing thing is the length of time it took for any handset developer to actually integrate it properly.
Rimm should pull a Nokia (Score:4, Insightful)
RIMM needs to decide it can compete as a hardware maker against samsung and HTC. If they can, then they should switch to android (for the apps and open platform) and implement their own enterprise technoogy over it. They should further do like the Amazon Fire and pre-process web fetches not just for speed but also for security (e.g. maintain ssl, filter out phishing attacks and viruses, restrict access to corporate approved functions, disable features like cameras or recoring in restricted corprorate areas). They will thus become the premier value added corprorate android phone.
If they can't compete against Samsung and HTC on hardware then they need to stay away from android. Windows 8 would be the logical choice and it is aligned with bussinesses. Their best route there would be to be the premier Intel based smart phone. Windows 8 is going to run better on intel and arm. Corporations will be able to port their proprietary windows platform codes to win8 on intel. And windows RT (arm) appears to be a disaster. So they could beat Nokia in the corporate smart phone area. Let nokia have the developing nations market. High margins for their enterprise system and a high barrier to entry for everyine else in that sector.
Re:Rimm should pull a Nokia (Score:5, Insightful)
Problem is, RIM thinks they're in the mobile phone business. They're not. They think they're in the handset business. They're not.
They're in the communications business.
The value behind the BlackBerry phone system is BlackBerry Messenger, not yet another new handset that in itself offers little over its competition. BBM, and the backend services, are what make the platform valuable. Without it, a BlackBerry is just a so-so phone with a decent keyboard.
To survive, RIM needs to roll out a secure, cross-platform messaging system for use on existing smartphones and tablets. That's iOS. That's Android. And that's Window's Phone.
See http://www.isights.org/2012/04/rim-would-prefer-to-license-blackberry-os-wrong.html [isights.org]
Re:Rimm should pull a Nokia (Score:5, Insightful)
The value behind RIM isn't BBM, it is BES. RIM does exchange integration very well, and that is from BES.
Re:Rimm should pull a Nokia (Score:3, Insightful)
Exactly how is this an advantage to the end-user? It's hard to make a UI for a phone that enables the user to run lots of apps in a useful way, and RIM doesn't seem to have done so yet, even for their tablet.
Just having something unique isn't particularly useful.