By: Martin Rand, III
Date: September 19, 2011
Things aren't looking good for Research In Motion. The company that brought us the Blackberry, last week reported its sales has taken a nose dive so massive, it's looking like the Blackberry will be the next smartphone to fall to the mighty superpowers of Apple and Google.
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| The Blackberry Torch was suppose to revive the failing Blackberry brand, but it wasn't enough. |
How did the Blackberry get here? The phone that made having a smartphone popular, is now being left in the dust by the competition. I'll examine.
Let's rewind the clock back five years. Almost everyone had a flip phone, probably a Motorola Razor. However, if you wanted to separate yourself from the average, you bought yourself a Blackberry. A Blackberry had a sense of sophistication about it; when people saw someone else using it, it made them think that person was actually doing something important on their phone. Blackberry was sitting on top of the smartphone world.
Now, move forward a year from then, when Apple unveils its first iPhone. The phone that had everyone buzzing and the one that Steve Jobs said would revolutionize the cellphone market. Blackberry didn't pay attention. What would this computer company know about making phones? Who would want a fully touchscreen phone when they can use Blackberry's trackball? And what the heck was an "app" anyway? Blackberry didn't think the iPhone would last.
Of course, when the iPhone sold-out everywhere on its first weekend, Blackberry had to take notice. So the following year, RIM released a fully touchscreen phone that was suppose to knock the iPhone off it's pedestal: the Blackberry Storm. However, the Storm was of lower quality compared to the iPhone in every way; and for the first time, Blackberry was looking up at someone in the smartphone market.
The next year, RIM took two major blows. The first was Google releasing its first fully touchscreen competition for the iPhone: the Motorola Droid. You remember those commercials advertising the phone as the fastest phone ever. No lags in between going from the internet, to apps, to games or to calling people.
The bad thing for RIM was that Google succeeded where it failed. The phone was just as fast, if not faster, than the iPhone and just as user friendly. To compete, RIM released the Blackberry Storm 2. This was the second blow. Once again, the Storm couldn't keep up with Apple or newcomer Google.
Last year was also a down year. The Blackberry Torch, which was suppose to give users the best of both touchscreen and the Blackberry keyboard, was just as bad as the Storm in terms of user friendliness, and was much slower than the new Android phones and the new iPhone 4. Also, Apple released a new device: the iPad. The tablet market heated up fast. Even though it was a different market, it produced the same result. Again, Apple dominated, Google kept up and RIM failed with its Blackberry Playbook.
Which brings us to the present. RIM is desperately trying to stay alive in a competitive market. Although, it does have a few bright spots to look forward to. It has new Blackberry devices coming out later this year which will be operating on Blackberry 7OS. Even though the current models using Blackberry 7OS haven't prospered, RIM is hoping for better results with these later models. Also, in 2012 RIM will release the Blackberry Colt. It will operate using RIM's brand new QNX operating system. QNX is suppose to be faster than AppleOS and Android.
Will this be enough for RIM to make a push and put Blackberry back on, or at least near, the top of the smartphone market?
Probably not. Even though, RIM is releasing new software, so is Apple and Google. Google is already working on its new Android Jellybean operating system; and Apple is set to release the iPhone 5 in October.
There's an old saying that stats, "What once was first, will one day be last." That's what happened with the Blackberry. The world of technology is always moving on to the next thing. The next fastest, the next biggest and the next innovation. On all counts, RIM has failed to keep the Blackberry up with technology.
In five years, Blackberry went from the gold standard to average and mediocre. It took five years for it to get in the predicament its in now; and in another five years, Blackberry will be a thing of the past.
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