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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

#111

Post by incision »

martythemaniak wrote: post #35

I've been thinking about RIM lately and I think they basically had chances to turn themselves around, but took neither. The first was in '08/'09 - shortly after the iPhone. Some companies (Google, Samsung) saw where the industry was going, made the appropriate decisions and are now profiting handsomely. In hindsight, that was the right time for RIM to acquire QNX and start on BB10, which might have done very well had…

>"...their strengths (security, gov & enterprise sales), they might be doing pretty-well today."

Yeah, while pretty much everyone witnessed and understands the failure of RIM to respond to the iPhone and hardware/OS missteps it might not be so well known that they were failing to properly service their existing strengths at the same time.

In my experience, lots of Enterprise/Government folks really didn't and likely still don't care about touchscreens and apps (for their employees), just email/PIN.

Problem was, the sometimes painful software/support plus lengthy, too frequent SRP outages ensured that BES and the Blackberries connected to them would be abandoned at the first opportunity.

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

#113

Post by eliben »

colmvp wrote: post #112
eliben wrote: post #106

It's amazing what a killer the smartphone market turned out to be. Nokia. RIM. Microsoft are in bad trouble. Intel. who else?

Is Intel really in any trouble? They're got a huge dominance on laptop/desktop processors, no?

Desktops are a huge, but declining business. In laptops they already have serious competition in Samsung's ARM-based Chromebooks. Besides, laptops also don't grow nearly as fast as smartphones and tablets. In markets, it's the growth that matters most, not the current revenue.

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

#114

Post by graeme »

dev_jim wrote: post #63
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…

Jeez man, Breaking Bad was just last week. Show a little originality in your postings.

It's a poem that had great meaning before Breaking Bad, and a poem that will retain it's meaning long after Breaking Bad is forgotten.

I never saw that show, and the poem seemed quite relevant to me.

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

#115

Post by Someone »

mikeash wrote: post #34
gummify wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

I'd put it under both "lack of technology innovation" and "lost touch with the consumer". Around 2007 with the release of the iPhone, the smartphone market shifted massively. Within a relatively short time, people wanted phones with (relatively speaking, for the time) gigantic screens, no hardware keyboards, fluid touch-based UIs, and abundant third-party apps. Apple delivered on this, and Google followed fairly clos…

I am not sure they ever were in touch with the consumer. Their business was built on the enterprise, but they somewhat accidentally got a lot of consumer customers (teenagers lured by the cheap (or was that even free?) messaging)

I don't think they ever truly realized what that should mean for their product range.

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

#116

Post by mturmon »

mjburgess wrote: post #99
jmduke wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's something particularly ironic about calling Ozymandias timeless.

The poem is itself ironic... it's about Ramses III who rule c. 1000 BC and yet was famous enough that poetry would be inspired by him 3000 years later.

I agree. When I was younger, I only got the obvious message about the transience of material accomplishment. The poem is more multifaceted than that.

One starting place is to think about the layers of interpretation (Ramses -> sculptor -> traveler -> narrator). Everyone concerned is still talking, in different ways, about the memory of Ramses.

As long as we're on the topic, here's one of my favorite expressions of parallels between us and people in the past:

https://plus.google.com/+Cornell/posts/MSaUEUpVB8q

This bench sits behind the library at Cornell University.

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

#117

Post by ZanyProgrammer »

dham wrote: post #45
Touche wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I'm not a fan of Microsoft, but they have a reputation of throwing money at something for a long period of time and it succeeding.

People keep saying this, but there's little evidence outside of the X Box.

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

#118

Post by zmmmmm »

corresation wrote: post #81
skylan_q wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter if their flagship phone that's out today is better than any mobile device that comes out in the next ten years. The customer has a grudge against them and decided they're losers. I could only image how much people would be for cancer if BB came out with a cure.

Or maybe it just isn't better? Or maybe it isn't better enough for people to endure the complete lack of platform ecosystem. Ecosystem is everything. Android overcame that (remember when few of the top tier apps or services like Netflix were available on Android?) largely via the pull of Google services, getting enough inertia that the apps came. Blackberry...it wasn't and isn't going to happen. It just isn't worth i…

Android started succeeding before it had an ecosystem. Establishing a viable app ecosystem actually took a long time.

The problem for RIM, Nokia, Microsoft and others is simple really: they fail to align their business interests with all the other stakeholders in the market. Explosive growth like Android's comes when you get a sudden synergy of different stakeholders whose interests all align. It's not one thing.

  * Customers want more choice in phone 
   (bigger screens, different styles, lower cost, etc.)
  * Carriers need an answer to the iPhone. Something where they retain 
    some tiny piece of control
  * OEMs desperately need an answer to the iPhone
  * Developers want something more open, with more control and less barriers
  * Media distributors want some other channel than Apple / iTunes
Basically, Android was a win-win-win-win for Google, carriers, developers, OEMs and customers, and it came at just the right time when all these needs were urgent. The common theme you see in all these other players is that they are not open, offer less choice, and they are trying to force others to cede control (license our software, no you can't have the source, no you can't customize it, etc).

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

#119

Post by wsc981 »

bsaul wrote: post #79

started developping apps for mobile in 2009. at that time, i aimed for ios development and blackberry. it took me 2 months to get my first app on ios, and i thought "ok, now let's start learning about blackberry". So, i downloaded their doc. iirc, they had three ways to develop apps. one was using web technology, and you couldn't do much. then they had two different sets of java apis : an old, discontinued one, with…

Your experience reminds me of an amusing open letter by a developer (original blog is down, I found a copy) to Developer Relations of RIM: https://www.memonic.com/user/ChrisPolus/folder/4738150b-bd22...

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

#120

Post by rogerbinns »

cgusto wrote: post #109
rogerbinns wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They lost me for two reasons. The first was updates and bug fixes. For example on my BB pausing the music player resulted in the battery being drained flat in less than an hour. They fixed that but of course the update never made it my phone and carrier. Add in 5 minute boot times, and randomly finding it locked up and needing a physical reset. Or the survey on a website about what your favourite app was to daily reb…

Unless I'm mistaken, every cell phone maker has only a standard one-year warranty. I agree with all the points you made. I just don't think a longer warranty would have helped them.

They could have addressed the issue and it doesn't matter if it was the warranty or some other mechanism. eg all they had to say was that if bluetooth failed on that model then they would replace the phone or give you a certain amount of credit towards a new one.

Bluetooth is critical functionality for anyone who commutes by car, and those who talk a lot. It isn't some rarely used side feature. A phone where this stops working is very notable, a huge pain and you are forced to resolve it almost immediately.

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