Blackberry

Financial data

The first Blackberry had been sold in 1999, 8 years before the first iPhone. Blackberry, formerly RIM, represented 50% of the smartphone market in 2009, two years after the first iPhone. However, the huge development of Apple in this field has reduced their part to 3%, even Microsoft beats them… If you consider the Stock Exchange, the situation is not better, the shares, reaching $200 in 2007, currently scores $10! They sell ten times less Blackberry than Apple sell iPhones and, moreover, they lose hundred millions of dollars each year. Finally, the layoffs, which started 2011 are going to reduce the number of employees, 20000 at the beginning, to 11500 within a few weeks…

Reasons of the crash

As a matter of fact, those reasons are numerous, the economic crisis, the problems of the OS (the former and the current one), the design and the competition with Apple (and Samsung).

Concerning the economic crisis, it has concerned the major part of firms and Blackberry is not an exception or… doesn’t seem to be one. There is, indeed, something definitely strange in their story. They have been considered as one of the most successful firm during the crisis, in 2008 we could read in newspapers that “RIM did not know the crisis” (Les Echos). Their main asset was the floor price was 10 times inferior to the iPhone one! However, during the following years, the iPhone achieved to get a brand image, superior to Blackberry, justifying its price until 2011 and the first massive layoffs!

Now, the OS problems must be summarized. The former flavor, nearly 10 years old, is considered has exceeded. If you compare the RIM OS with Windows mobile, the iOS or the former Android flavors, you will understand that’s it’s not easy to use, with a old-fashioned design and a few changes with each and every updates. The BB10, the last one, knows similar problems. For instance, many developers do not produce and adapt their applications to BB10… As a consequence, users have...