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BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

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Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#21

Post by bsullivan01 »

Touche wrote: post #16

I sympathize strongly with the people who lost their job. I don't, however, sympathize with the company that made their decision to go it alone despite overwhelming evidence that there isn't room for another platform. iOS, Android, the Web. That's it. That's all there's going to be for the foreseeable future in mobile. Even Microsoft is failing at this. How much evidence does a company need to see that their strategy…

>>Even Microsoft is failing at this. How much evidence does a company need to see that their strategy was doomed?

The BB, Nokia, HTC etc problem is one of cash /runaway. Nokia was almost broke and how many $950M loss quarters can BB take? Not that many. Microsoft can keep bankrolling Windows Phones for a decade waiting for iPhone and Android to make mistakes and no one will even question them.

Look at what they've done for xBox and Bing.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#22

Post by rimantas »

maxsilver wrote: post #7

It's unfortunate, as someone who just purchased a Q10 (switched from Android), I think they've finally got their act together and released something excellent. The Q10's battery life is great, the hardware keyboard is solid and travels well. The Paratek antenna gets the best reception and data connection of any device I've ever used. The BB10 software isn't great, but it's decent. (It's certainly far better than wher…

Alas, Q10 does not compete with iOS from 6 years ago.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#23

Post by scrabble »

gummify wrote: post #19
mrcharles wrote: post #4

Was digging up some numbers. In 2010, BlackBerry still sold more phones than Apple. How the mighty have fallen.

What were the real problems then that led to their fall? Lack of technology innovation? badly run company and operations? lost touch with the consumer? All of the above?

There were a few key parts to this (and lots more that I'm missing).

1] OS felt dated. Failure to come closer to what customers wanted on a timely basis.

2] Poor app developer experience.

3] A lot of different hardware specs against which to develop apps.

4] Not enough apps. Missing key apps.

5] Slow to innovate after settling on major patent case. The company became very lawyer focused which slowed innovation to a crawl.

I'm sure I'm missing tons of stuff and this would be a great case study, but as a former employee this is coming from my perspective.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#24

Post by Liuser »

kunai wrote: post #6
iamshs wrote: post #3

NO. Teary eyed. :( 3.7 million phone sales are nothing. Only if they had copied iOS the Samsung way in time.

Why? The problem isn't with the phones. The Z10 and Q10 are fantastic and BB10 is probably the best business-centric OS ever written. The problem is that the applications are just not there, and that people associate BlackBerry with reboots, battery pulls, and outdated, clunky software, even though that's not the case. It's an image problem, not a phone problem. They can't market like Apple used to. If they could, th…

To add on, it does not help that BlackBerry makes the application submission process difficult. I submit and update our 30+ mobile applications on Apple, Google Play, Amazon and BlackBerry. No experience with Windows yet. However, compared to those listed stores that I have experience with, BlackBerry is my least favorite.

I use the same binary build that I submit with ease for Google and Amazon, but BlackBerry tends to deny our application every once in awhile. Just figuring out how to navigate the application web portal to figure out why it was denied is a challenge. Why is it so hard to wrap the "Denied" text with a direct link to the reason as to why it was denied? Instead I need to crawl the page to find the reason.

Another trouble that comes to mind more recently is that they added some sort of additional min-os requirement for a config/manifest file with a cryptic error message that needed resolving before the binary was allowed to be submitted.

I would have thought it would be far easier to get apps through BlackBerry since they want more apps for their devices. Instead, I personally find getting apps for BB discouraging. Windows in the same space even approached and offered to pay us to develop an app for their store.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#25

Post by GrinningFool »

maxsilver wrote: post #7

It's unfortunate, as someone who just purchased a Q10 (switched from Android), I think they've finally got their act together and released something excellent. The Q10's battery life is great, the hardware keyboard is solid and travels well. The Paratek antenna gets the best reception and data connection of any device I've ever used. The BB10 software isn't great, but it's decent. (It's certainly far better than wher…

This is frustrating - I agree that they've finally gotten their act together, particularly with 10.2. The writing has been on the wall for a while - I stopped building apps for them earlier this year.

I've tried Android and iPhone and don't particularly want to return to either one. The former because of too many apps that want all the permissions under the sun while the OS offers a complete lack of fine-grained controls of them[1], and a subpar UI experience (subjective, I know). The latter due to lack of control without rooting it. My windows 8 desktop experience has spoiled that OS for me on a phone, fairly or otherwise.

But it begins to look like I will have no choice very soon. I hope they manage to pull out of this - they're still releasing a new flagship, and have other irons in the fire - but it's not looking good.

[1] as in 'yes, let the app get to GPS, but no do not let it get to my personal data or phone info'. Something BBOS legacy offered, and BB10 only slightly less - when you make an app you were expected to plan for the user to deny functionality and degrade nicely.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#26

Post by Touche »

bsullivan01 wrote: post #21
Touche wrote: post #16

I sympathize strongly with the people who lost their job. I don't, however, sympathize with the company that made their decision to go it alone despite overwhelming evidence that there isn't room for another platform. iOS, Android, the Web. That's it. That's all there's going to be for the foreseeable future in mobile. Even Microsoft is failing at this. How much evidence does a company need to see that their strategy…

>>Even Microsoft is failing at this. How much evidence does a company need to see that their strategy was doomed? The BB, Nokia, HTC etc problem is one of cash /runaway. Nokia was almost broke and how many $950M loss quarters can BB take? Not that many. Microsoft can keep bankrolling Windows Phones for a decade waiting for iPhone and Android to make mistakes and no one will even question them. Look at what they've do…

Aren't they losing money on Bing, and are basically break even on Xbox? I predict Microsoft will eventually give up on Windows Phone and probably the consumer market in general. The momentum is overwhelmingly against them, but of course they'll go down with the ship almost all the way. What they should probably do is maintain an Android fork.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#27

Post by GrinningFool »

rimantas wrote: post #22
maxsilver wrote: post #7

It's unfortunate, as someone who just purchased a Q10 (switched from Android), I think they've finally got their act together and released something excellent. The Q10's battery life is great, the hardware keyboard is solid and travels well. The Paratek antenna gets the best reception and data connection of any device I've ever used. The BB10 software isn't great, but it's decent. (It's certainly far better than wher…

Alas, Q10 does not compete with iOS from 6 years ago.

That's an interesting kneejerk response that one hears variations of whenever anybody brings up any smartphone OS that is not their One True OS. Do you have particular things that it doesn't do that iOS of six years ago did?

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#28

Post by methodin »

If any new phone wants a decent market share they have to start with the developers - they are the ones who will carry it along until enough 2 year contracts expire to grow the user base. Blackberry simply failed on this front so it's no wonder they are struggling. They followed Microsoft's path of screwing developers which clearly was a bad move.

There is always room for new devices, though. If FF or Ubuntu develop the repertoire with the developers first they have a fighting chance. There are pretty much no companies left that can sell just on their history and existing fan-base alone.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#29

Post by hvs »

themckman wrote: post #12
spodek wrote: post #2

The timeless story of Ozymandias -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias -- (if you don't know the 1818 sonnet by Shelley, read it before downvoting. It's relevant and timeless) I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command Tell that its sc…

Certainly relevant, but, Breaking Bad fan?

I first thought of "Watchmen" by Alan Moore.

Re: BlackBerry to cut 4,500 jobs, predicts 2nd quarter loss of $950M

#30

Post by GrinningFool »

derefr wrote: post #13
maxsilver wrote: post #7

It's unfortunate, as someone who just purchased a Q10 (switched from Android), I think they've finally got their act together and released something excellent. The Q10's battery life is great, the hardware keyboard is solid and travels well. The Paratek antenna gets the best reception and data connection of any device I've ever used. The BB10 software isn't great, but it's decent. (It's certainly far better than wher…

Seems to me the best thing that could happen to them would be a bankruptcy followed by either a sell-off, or a split-off, of their design division (and all associated hardware contracts.) Then you'd have the equivalent of a fresh start-up making these phones, with no debts. They'd probably do pretty well.

THey're already debt-free, I'm not sure that bankruptcy can help?
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