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BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

141 points by endswapper 10y ago

Cuuugi 10y ago
I've got a Priv, and i am happy with it. Being a resident of SW Ontario, i knew this was coming for years. It's still sad though.
scj 10y ago
I have to admit that I've never used a BB, but isn't their brand identity around the keypads on their phones? Or do they have an amazing piece of software that I'm missing out on?
- coev 10y ago
  BBM was their killer app for a while, but WhatsApp and the like have overtaken it. In addition they had their enterprise mail server that lots of businesses used.
- Cuuugi 10y ago
  IIRC their big money maker is the Blackberry Enterprise Server, or BES. I'm not up to date on the feature's so don't quote me on it. It used to partition my phone so i had a Work/Personal work space (so that work could wipe my work related info) They pivoted to a multiplatform system back when things started to look grim for Blackberry, and that's probably whats kept them afloat. It's massively overpriced for what it is, but people still seem to be buying it. http://ca.blackberry.com/enterprise.html http://ca.blackberry.com/enterprise.html
  - Cuuugi 10y ago
    Oh, Yeah! To add on to my point, Blackberry released their private keys to the RCMP, so all BBM traffic could be decrypted. They didn't release the BES keys though because feature? http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/rcmp-blackberry-hack-montreal-mob-murder-pub-ban-lifted-1.3629222 http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/rcmp-blackberry-hack-montr...
    - snuxoll 10y ago
      Can't release BES keys unless BlackBerry put a backdoor in the software, the whole point of BES is you don't go through the BIS but communicate with the BES directly with encryption managed directly by it.
anexprogrammer 10y ago
That's a shame, I figure we need a few players trying to be different. The phone space has become so homogenised. I had half an eye open for the next model in the Classic range, to switch from Android. As my usage has changed the last few years, having a proper keyboard again is more appealing, along with less desire for a passive consumption tablet.
eat_your_potato 10y ago
It can give something good like Google's Nexus, or something very poor depending on the manufacturer chosen
budhajeewa 10y ago
Just kill it in entirety already and move on to new things. Neither Android nor Apple is going to die in the forseeable future, so a BlackBerry operating system doesn't stand a chance.
- maxsilver 10y ago
  > Just kill it in entirety already (snip) a BlackBerry operating system doesn't stand a chance. They did that already. BlackBerry's last two phones were 100% pure Android devices, with full access to Play Store apps, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Docs, etc, just like every other major Android phone has.
  - dan1234 10y ago
    If they're not making BBOS and they're not designing new hardware, what are they doing now? Are they now just app developers?
    - xeromal 10y ago
      I know their blackberry messenger is popular in some circles. People perceive it as more secure.
    - roymurdock 10y ago
      They have a strong embedded OS/tools/middleware (QNX) and cryptography (Certicom) portfolio with QNX in particular being a major player in the automotive embedded software/middleware market and they are moving into the medical market. They are reorganizing around the IoT movement as their software assets can be retooled for more lucrative "connected devices" markets outside of smartphones.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
maxsilver 10y ago
For what it's worth, the BlackBerry Priv is hands-down my favorite Android phone I've ever owned. It's a great product that deserved more success than it received.
- 51Cards 10y ago
  Friend of mine just bought one a couple weeks ago and has been thrilled with it. I may take a look at one myself.
whitecarpet 10y ago
I've been never more productive with my smartphones than with a Blackberry. The BB's keyboards are still unmatched. While I can type as fast with my iPhone 7 where cursor control is thanks to 3D touch great a BB Classic is still better—reasons why: - You can rest your fingers on the keyboard like on a real keyboard without pressing the keys (you can't do that on a touch screen) - After a short time you start to touch type; although it's possible with an iPhone too, it's not that convenient and most keep looking on their keyboards - Cursor control with the BB mini trackpad above the keyboard (Classic and other models), is just terrific and often needed - Best is that all good apps including the launcher support keyboard short-cuts and you will heavily use them since the keyboard is always present (Classic and other models) - To give you a comparison: using a BB with a keyboard feels like using Vim vs a GUI-based editor; you use Vim only with Vim's key binding fast and reliable, no need to open sliding menus, touch buttons, etc.; it's very satisfying and I really miss those times The path BB went the recent months—putting Android on BB devices + some extra security stuff (the so called DTEK)—was a good decision. But they brought the super expensive Priv device with a slider keyboard which is for a BB rather mediocre and not like the ones from the Classic, Bold, etc. Few weeks ago, they brought us a non keyboard Alcatel-OEM phone which does not differ from any other Android except this DTEK software which you can just download on any phone (why???). What they just need to do is to put Android on the Blackberry Classic or some phone with a similar form factor. That's it. Before they don't do this final step, they can't claim that hardware is not profitable. I don't get why the CEO didn't do this as the first thing when he started his Android strategy.
- PhantomGremlin 10y ago
  The BB's keyboards are still unmatched. Yeah, but does that really matter any more? I've found that my iPhone's speech-to-text is pretty darned good, as long as I speak with a slightly staccato cadence to make it clear where the word divisions are. I can do that much more quickly than I can type. Generally I only have problems when the connection to the server doing the conversion is poor. I've never used Android's speech-to-text, but I have to assume it is equivalent. Can an experienced BB typist really outperform speech-to-text conversion?
  - 10y ago
Taylor_OD 10y ago
BlackBerry's keyboard is its killer app. I still cant type on my touchscreen without looking. When I was 14 I was able to have a conversation via text under the table while eating dinner with my family thanks to my old keyboard phone. If a android phone was released with a keyboard I think it could carve out a profitable chunk of the market.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- oldmanjay 10y ago
  There have been many failed attempts at exactly that. Those who want a keyboard are vocal about the ostensible size of the market but don't seem to spend enough money to support the claim.
nathcd 10y ago
I'd been holding out hope for a good Blackberry Classic-like with Android for a while (like others in the thread, clearly). If the BB Rome/Mercury is indeed cancelled, my only other hope is that a future Fairphone[1] device gets a physical keyboard module. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of hope that it'd be anywhere near as good as a BB keyboard, nor that it'd have features like sliding over the keyboard to move the cursor/scroll a page like recent BBs have had. [1] https://fairphone.com/ https://fairphone.com/
wcummings 10y ago
I have a Q10, pretty decent phone, love their keyboards. This is too bad.
TruthSHIFT 10y ago
"We'll be fine." -BlackBerry CEO Jim Balsillie
- wreft 10y ago
  What was he supposed to say? "We're fucked, sell the stock, guys."
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
hbosch 10y ago
How many companies not named Apple are doing great hardware AND software anymore? Sounds like a cold world for these types of players... Seems more and more people who did both are simply picking one side anymore.
- MikusR 10y ago
  About as many as companies named Apple.
- SG- 10y ago
  For a while Nintendo, and they also got rid of the headphone jack on the GBA at one point.
IshKebab 10y ago
Someone at work had a Blackberry Android phone that I had a brief play with. Hardware seemed nice and it had the latest security updates. Maybe they just need to rebrand.
- dradtke 10y ago
  Yeah, even BB10 was pretty solid. It was a completely different operating system that kept the name, and the result was that nobody realized how much it had changed.
- Silhouette 10y ago
  Hardware seemed nice and it had the latest security updates. Ironically, it was security that put me off BlackBerry as a brand. There was the whole mess over whether their messaging systems were actually secure in technical terms, and the final conclusion seemed to be that some of them weren't. Apple handled the related issues much better. More than that, when they brought out the Priv and made a big deal about putting their DTEK software on top of Android for security and privacy, there was a glaring hole in their presentation: it was all about detecting bad things when they were already happening, but I never found a single reference to preventing those bad things from happening in the first place. Those two issues convinced me very clearly that modern BlackBerry is more about style than substance when it comes to security and privacy. It's sad, because as someone with a very productivity/professional focus with mobile devices, I should have been their ideal customer and they should have been the closest to my ideal phone maker of any of the major brands.
  - ClassyJacket 10y ago
    When Blackberry went Android, they threw security out the window. Until Marshmallow, Android made absolutely no attempt at any kind of security whatsoever - any app could read anything on your phone and there was nothing you could do to stop it - messages, contacts, microphone, location - and to this day, apps still have to voluntarily opt in to the permission system.
    - Silhouette 10y ago
jagermo 10y ago
This sucks. The Priv is a decent android phone with an excellent keyboard and monthly security updates. So sad. On the other hand, they screwed themselves pretty good.
camelNotation 10y ago
There is a growing market for "dumb phones" among those of us that are disillusioned with the smartphone lifestyle. It's not enormous, but it's out there. Blackberry needs to target them. If you buy a dumb phone, you not only give up the life-sucking abyss of social media and mobile gaming, but you also give up decent cameras and useful tools like navigation, group messages, and keyboard typing. For those that want to escape the hole of smartphone existence, there is a horrible trade-off to be made. Basic tools we are used to having must be given up just for us to escape mobile app hell. It shouldn't be that way. I want a Blackberry that allows me to group message, use a mobile browser, use GPS navigation, take great photos, and type on their excellent physical keyboard without any of the other temptations that come with smartphones. As a bonus, I would love for it to be super secure. If they created a device for me that did that, I would pay them so much money.
- alex_c 10y ago
  >Blackberry needs to target them. Why? Dumb phones are more or less a commodity - margins are tiny, and volumes are likely small. If Blackberry lost at the high-end smartphone game, then switching to enterprise security or whatever they're working on makes way more sense than shipping a few hundred thousand units of $100 dumb phones.
  - camelNotation 10y ago
    If you read my full post, I'm arguing for them to change the paradigm of the "dumb phone." A dumb phone as it stands now is a commodity. I'm arguing that there exists an untapped market of people who want a hybrid, capable of filling the multi-functional tool role of a smartphone WITHOUT the focus on social media, video, music, and other entertainment roles. Why do I need to buy a flagship smartphone to get the best camera? Why do I need to buy a smartphone to get group messages? Why do I need to buy a smartphone to use my phone as a flashlight or navigate with Google Maps? Why do I need to buy a smartphone to type on an intuitive keyboard? I'm not a teenager. I want a productivity device, not a gaming system or a miniature television or a twitter feed.
    - 10y ago
msh 10y ago
This can hardly surprise anyone.
jkot 10y ago
They should have done this 5 years ago. Dozens Chinese companies can produce quality phones with keyboard. Imagine if BB would produce hardened-secured-enterprisey version of Android, rather than doing their 'not invented here'. They could had 30% of market by now.
- wreft 10y ago
  They do provide an android phone.
  - jkot 10y ago
    too little, too late
- Silhouette 10y ago
  Imagine if BB would produce hardened-secured-enterprisey version of Android, rather than doing their 'not invented here'. Isn't that exactly what the Priv was supposed to be?
- serge2k 10y ago
  > Imagine if BB would produce hardened-secured-enterprisey version of Android, rather than doing their 'not invented here'. They could had 30% of market by now. Doubt it. People don't care about security. If people cared then other companies would just bother to release security updates and try to actually harden android.
kebolio 10y ago
Echoes the sale of the ThinkPad to Lenovo...
amenghra 10y ago
BlackBerry had a fine product for a specific market segment until the press/media started comparing them to consumer devices. What if they had focused on what they were good at?
- bdcravens 10y ago
  There were plenty of consumers buying Blackberries. As sales contracted, most companies will try to regain that, as opposed to admitting defeat and refocusing on core competencies, especially when you're publicly traded.
- pwthornton 10y ago
  It eventually became a point where the iPhone was a better consumer and professional device. The Blackberry simply wasn't a real smartphone with a real OS.
  - wNk6A23YB 10y ago
    The iPhone is not a better professional device than a BB OS device from an organizational standpoint. For instance as an MDM administrator you can't control the OS version of company devices other than saying it must be within a range for the device to connect to company resources. This creates a risk that users will update the OS before a required app supports the new version. You also can not capture SMS/iMessage data which leaves regulated industries needing third party solutions which are not carrier agnostic (eg Smarsh). Apple is slowly catching up with features like DEP, VPP, and supervised mode but it has a long way to go.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- tacostakohashi 10y ago
  They did. They just weren't as good at that as everybody else.
- poopsintub 10y ago
  They were ruling the world until smartphones without keyboards became cheap. The demand for a tactile keyboard shrunk to India and a bunch of old men and women running the government. Now they don't even use them anymore.
JohnTHaller 10y ago
I'd still pay good money for an Android phone with a proper landscape slide out keyboard. Think an updated G1/Dream or G2/Desire Z but with a nice 5"+ screen and top tier specs.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
nailer 10y ago
BlackBerry owns a bunch of patents around Elliptic Curve Cryptography [1] - since they own Certicom [2]. Maybe they're going to troll as a business model? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECC_patents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECC_patents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry_Limited#Certicom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry_Limited#Certicom
- erichocean 10y ago
  And yet they don't seem to apply[0] to what may be the most widely used ECC library, NaCl[1]. So maybe they're not really worth much... [0] http://cr.yp.to/ecdh/patents.html http://cr.yp.to/ecdh/patents.html [1] https://nacl.cr.yp.to/ https://nacl.cr.yp.to/
  - nailer 10y ago
    Thanks re: [0]! Re [1] wouldn't openssl/boringssl/etc be the most widely used ECC library? Most people are using ECC with older style non-Edwards curves, also openssl has curve25519 in the next major release. NaCl seems to only do newer algos according to https://nacl.cr.yp.to/securing-communication.pdf https://nacl.cr.yp.to/securing-communication.pdf - what software uses NaCl now? Thanks!
_Codemonkeyism 10y ago
I was a Blackberry user and evangelist vor many years (keyboard shortcuts made me very productive and the old Blackberies were built like tanks). Then I've got a Passport, which is the crappiest phone I've ever had. I did love the swipe to mail, message hub, scrolling keyboard and keyboard. Reception was so bad to render it unusable. It fell to the ground from hip level and had a cracked board. "Android" compatibily never worked for me as most software I've tried to use needed Google Play services which were a pain to maintain and install.
sxcurry 10y ago
On mobile trends: "The most exciting mobile trend is full Qwerty keyboards. I'm sorry, it really is. I'm not making this up." Lazaridis, May 2008. Almost Trump-like in his dogged grasp of fantasy.
eumenides1 10y ago
BB's strong suit isn't software or hardware. It's semi-competent at both. BBM is amazing and BB10 OS is pretty amazing (name a phone that can multi-task now, i.e. play youtube and write an email). But it also has lots of stinkers. The keyboard is pretty rocking, devices can take a beating, but BB has various hardware issues. Battery pulling to solve problems etc. Now that they are going android, nobody knew that the world could only support 2 phone ecosystems as opposed to 3, i think they need to leverage the strengths. Keep making the excellent software, cut the chafe (BB virtual keyboard, BB Hub, BBM, etc). Also they have should leverage their hardware group and make excellent and robust android phones. 1. keep making the BB Classic using android OS. People want it. 2. Make phones that are robust. People want phones that can be beat up, 3. Make android phones that have better than 2 years of support. iPhones support 3-5 years which is amazing compared to android. I want to buy an android phone that i don't have to throw out every 2 years. They have excellent devs that could extend the shelf life of older android versions or just BB phones.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- hobbes78 10y ago
  Even my cheap Android phone allows writing an email whilst watching a YouTube video: http://imgur.com/a/s9MpE http://imgur.com/a/s9MpE It's a Galaxy A5 (2016) and it's a fraction of the price of a Galaxy S7 or iPhone 7...
gcb0 10y ago
as an owner of an Android black berry, i say they are killing the wrong side. the hardware is still good (Android phone with slide out keyboard where each key has capacitive touch sensors) the software not only is pure garbage, it keeps getting worse with each update. if blackberry did open hardware, and released all specs so we could have true open Android phones, it would dominate the market as the pc clones dominated the computer market of the past.
ultrasaurus 10y ago
I was at the (only?) Blackberry store in New York. They had some nice looking phones, but the magic was gone.
protomyth 10y ago
I was pretty excited about the concept[1] (maybe not the exact execution[2]) of the keyboard on the Passport. It seems like there was still a place for BlackBerry but the chasing Apple doomed them[3]. 1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNVT95S6_eE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNVT95S6_eE 2) I would have preferred more keys 3) from the book https://www.amazon.com/Losing-Signal-Extraordinary-Spectacular-BlackBerry/dp/1250060176/ https://www.amazon.com/Losing-Signal-Extraordinary-Spectacul...
phodo 10y ago
This is out of the Sega playbook https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega
aziraphale 10y ago
Anyone who did Blackberry development back in the day, before OS 10 and Android, knows why they're now in this state. It was an abysmal experience, and they either didn't care or didn't understand the importance of keeping developers onside once Apple and Google started taking market share. Code-signing servers that were down on a regular basis, sometimes for days, which meant you couldn't deploy your app to real hardware. Simulators that took 5-10 minutes to start up and had no hot-reloading. God knows how many different system configurations that you were expected to support, with different screen sizes, bit-depth, input devices, internet connectivity (they used to offer mobile data plans which would only connect to "approved" services), etc. No official developer support beyond the sparsely-populated community forums. It was just horrible. Then when something finally did click it was far too late (by at least 5 years) to improve their own ecosystem, hence the jump to Android. I have very little sympathy for them now. You reap what you sow.
- avh02 10y ago
  Man, I'm always surprised there aren't more pissed off BB developers. It was a horrible experience, and I agree that it's their stubbornness and unwillingness to improve and go all the NIH-syndrome that ended them up here. If anything, their hardware wasn't bad, it's their software that was rotten.
Fej 10y ago
How is BlackBerry going to pivot? Does anyone actually care about their software? Don't Apple, Google, and Samsung provide "good enough" enterprise services? If so then I really don't see what their plans are.
- anmorgan 10y ago
  They also have QNX. http://www.qnx.com/content/qnx/en.html http://www.qnx.com/content/qnx/en.html
pcollinsmokonut 10y ago
"BlackBerry confirms it will stick to its knitting as a patent troll"

141 points by endswapper 10y ago

I've got a Priv, and i am happy with it. Being a resident of SW Ontario, i knew this was coming for years. It's still sad though.

scj 10y ago

I have to admit that I've never used a BB, but isn't their brand identity around the keypads on their phones? Or do they have an amazing piece of software that I'm missing out on?

coev 10y ago
BBM was their killer app for a while, but WhatsApp and the like have overtaken it. In addition they had their enterprise mail server that lots of businesses used.
Cuuugi 10y ago
IIRC their big money maker is the Blackberry Enterprise Server, or BES. I'm not up to date on the feature's so don't quote me on it. It used to partition my phone so i had a Work/Personal work space (so that work could wipe my work related info) They pivoted to a multiplatform system back when things started to look grim for Blackberry, and that's probably whats kept them afloat. It's massively overpriced for what it is, but people still seem to be buying it. http://ca.blackberry.com/enterprise.html http://ca.blackberry.com/enterprise.html
- Cuuugi 10y ago
  Oh, Yeah! To add on to my point, Blackberry released their private keys to the RCMP, so all BBM traffic could be decrypted. They didn't release the BES keys though because feature? http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/rcmp-blackberry-hack-montreal-mob-murder-pub-ban-lifted-1.3629222 http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/rcmp-blackberry-hack-montr...
  - snuxoll 10y ago
    Can't release BES keys unless BlackBerry put a backdoor in the software, the whole point of BES is you don't go through the BIS but communicate with the BES directly with encryption managed directly by it.

anexprogrammer 10y ago

That's a shame, I figure we need a few players trying to be different. The phone space has become so homogenised. I had half an eye open for the next model in the Classic range, to switch from Android. As my usage has changed the last few years, having a proper keyboard again is more appealing, along with less desire for a passive consumption tablet.

eat_your_potato 10y ago

It can give something good like Google's Nexus, or something very poor depending on the manufacturer chosen

budhajeewa 10y ago

Just kill it in entirety already and move on to new things. Neither Android nor Apple is going to die in the forseeable future, so a BlackBerry operating system doesn't stand a chance.

maxsilver 10y ago
> Just kill it in entirety already (snip) a BlackBerry operating system doesn't stand a chance. They did that already. BlackBerry's last two phones were 100% pure Android devices, with full access to Play Store apps, Gmail, Google Maps, Google Docs, etc, just like every other major Android phone has.
- dan1234 10y ago
  If they're not making BBOS and they're not designing new hardware, what are they doing now? Are they now just app developers?
  - xeromal 10y ago
    I know their blackberry messenger is popular in some circles. People perceive it as more secure.
  - roymurdock 10y ago
    They have a strong embedded OS/tools/middleware (QNX) and cryptography (Certicom) portfolio with QNX in particular being a major player in the automotive embedded software/middleware market and they are moving into the medical market. They are reorganizing around the IoT movement as their software assets can be retooled for more lucrative "connected devices" markets outside of smartphones.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

maxsilver 10y ago

For what it's worth, the BlackBerry Priv is hands-down my favorite Android phone I've ever owned. It's a great product that deserved more success than it received.

51Cards 10y ago
Friend of mine just bought one a couple weeks ago and has been thrilled with it. I may take a look at one myself.

whitecarpet 10y ago

I've been never more productive with my smartphones than with a Blackberry. The BB's keyboards are still unmatched. While I can type as fast with my iPhone 7 where cursor control is thanks to 3D touch great a BB Classic is still better—reasons why: - You can rest your fingers on the keyboard like on a real keyboard without pressing the keys (you can't do that on a touch screen) - After a short time you start to touch type; although it's possible with an iPhone too, it's not that convenient and most keep looking on their keyboards - Cursor control with the BB mini trackpad above the keyboard (Classic and other models), is just terrific and often needed - Best is that all good apps including the launcher support keyboard short-cuts and you will heavily use them since the keyboard is always present (Classic and other models) - To give you a comparison: using a BB with a keyboard feels like using Vim vs a GUI-based editor; you use Vim only with Vim's key binding fast and reliable, no need to open sliding menus, touch buttons, etc.; it's very satisfying and I really miss those times The path BB went the recent months—putting Android on BB devices + some extra security stuff (the so called DTEK)—was a good decision. But they brought the super expensive Priv device with a slider keyboard which is for a BB rather mediocre and not like the ones from the Classic, Bold, etc. Few weeks ago, they brought us a non keyboard Alcatel-OEM phone which does not differ from any other Android except this DTEK software which you can just download on any phone (why???). What they just need to do is to put Android on the Blackberry Classic or some phone with a similar form factor. That's it. Before they don't do this final step, they can't claim that hardware is not profitable. I don't get why the CEO didn't do this as the first thing when he started his Android strategy.

PhantomGremlin 10y ago
The BB's keyboards are still unmatched. Yeah, but does that really matter any more? I've found that my iPhone's speech-to-text is pretty darned good, as long as I speak with a slightly staccato cadence to make it clear where the word divisions are. I can do that much more quickly than I can type. Generally I only have problems when the connection to the server doing the conversion is poor. I've never used Android's speech-to-text, but I have to assume it is equivalent. Can an experienced BB typist really outperform speech-to-text conversion?
- 10y ago

Taylor_OD 10y ago

BlackBerry's keyboard is its killer app. I still cant type on my touchscreen without looking. When I was 14 I was able to have a conversation via text under the table while eating dinner with my family thanks to my old keyboard phone. If a android phone was released with a keyboard I think it could carve out a profitable chunk of the market.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
oldmanjay 10y ago
There have been many failed attempts at exactly that. Those who want a keyboard are vocal about the ostensible size of the market but don't seem to spend enough money to support the claim.

nathcd 10y ago

I'd been holding out hope for a good Blackberry Classic-like with Android for a while (like others in the thread, clearly). If the BB Rome/Mercury is indeed cancelled, my only other hope is that a future Fairphone[1] device gets a physical keyboard module. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of hope that it'd be anywhere near as good as a BB keyboard, nor that it'd have features like sliding over the keyboard to move the cursor/scroll a page like recent BBs have had. [1] https://fairphone.com/ https://fairphone.com/

wcummings 10y ago

I have a Q10, pretty decent phone, love their keyboards. This is too bad.

TruthSHIFT 10y ago

"We'll be fine." -BlackBerry CEO Jim Balsillie

wreft 10y ago
What was he supposed to say? "We're fucked, sell the stock, guys."
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

hbosch 10y ago

How many companies not named Apple are doing great hardware AND software anymore? Sounds like a cold world for these types of players... Seems more and more people who did both are simply picking one side anymore.

MikusR 10y ago
About as many as companies named Apple.
SG- 10y ago
For a while Nintendo, and they also got rid of the headphone jack on the GBA at one point.

IshKebab 10y ago

Someone at work had a Blackberry Android phone that I had a brief play with. Hardware seemed nice and it had the latest security updates. Maybe they just need to rebrand.

dradtke 10y ago
Yeah, even BB10 was pretty solid. It was a completely different operating system that kept the name, and the result was that nobody realized how much it had changed.
Silhouette 10y ago
Hardware seemed nice and it had the latest security updates. Ironically, it was security that put me off BlackBerry as a brand. There was the whole mess over whether their messaging systems were actually secure in technical terms, and the final conclusion seemed to be that some of them weren't. Apple handled the related issues much better. More than that, when they brought out the Priv and made a big deal about putting their DTEK software on top of Android for security and privacy, there was a glaring hole in their presentation: it was all about detecting bad things when they were already happening, but I never found a single reference to preventing those bad things from happening in the first place. Those two issues convinced me very clearly that modern BlackBerry is more about style than substance when it comes to security and privacy. It's sad, because as someone with a very productivity/professional focus with mobile devices, I should have been their ideal customer and they should have been the closest to my ideal phone maker of any of the major brands.
- ClassyJacket 10y ago
  When Blackberry went Android, they threw security out the window. Until Marshmallow, Android made absolutely no attempt at any kind of security whatsoever - any app could read anything on your phone and there was nothing you could do to stop it - messages, contacts, microphone, location - and to this day, apps still have to voluntarily opt in to the permission system.
  - Silhouette 10y ago

jagermo 10y ago

This sucks. The Priv is a decent android phone with an excellent keyboard and monthly security updates. So sad. On the other hand, they screwed themselves pretty good.

camelNotation 10y ago

There is a growing market for "dumb phones" among those of us that are disillusioned with the smartphone lifestyle. It's not enormous, but it's out there. Blackberry needs to target them. If you buy a dumb phone, you not only give up the life-sucking abyss of social media and mobile gaming, but you also give up decent cameras and useful tools like navigation, group messages, and keyboard typing. For those that want to escape the hole of smartphone existence, there is a horrible trade-off to be made. Basic tools we are used to having must be given up just for us to escape mobile app hell. It shouldn't be that way. I want a Blackberry that allows me to group message, use a mobile browser, use GPS navigation, take great photos, and type on their excellent physical keyboard without any of the other temptations that come with smartphones. As a bonus, I would love for it to be super secure. If they created a device for me that did that, I would pay them so much money.

alex_c 10y ago
>Blackberry needs to target them. Why? Dumb phones are more or less a commodity - margins are tiny, and volumes are likely small. If Blackberry lost at the high-end smartphone game, then switching to enterprise security or whatever they're working on makes way more sense than shipping a few hundred thousand units of $100 dumb phones.
- camelNotation 10y ago
  If you read my full post, I'm arguing for them to change the paradigm of the "dumb phone." A dumb phone as it stands now is a commodity. I'm arguing that there exists an untapped market of people who want a hybrid, capable of filling the multi-functional tool role of a smartphone WITHOUT the focus on social media, video, music, and other entertainment roles. Why do I need to buy a flagship smartphone to get the best camera? Why do I need to buy a smartphone to get group messages? Why do I need to buy a smartphone to use my phone as a flashlight or navigate with Google Maps? Why do I need to buy a smartphone to type on an intuitive keyboard? I'm not a teenager. I want a productivity device, not a gaming system or a miniature television or a twitter feed.
  - 10y ago

msh 10y ago

This can hardly surprise anyone.

jkot 10y ago

They should have done this 5 years ago. Dozens Chinese companies can produce quality phones with keyboard. Imagine if BB would produce hardened-secured-enterprisey version of Android, rather than doing their 'not invented here'. They could had 30% of market by now.

wreft 10y ago
They do provide an android phone.
- jkot 10y ago
  too little, too late
Silhouette 10y ago
Imagine if BB would produce hardened-secured-enterprisey version of Android, rather than doing their 'not invented here'. Isn't that exactly what the Priv was supposed to be?
serge2k 10y ago
> Imagine if BB would produce hardened-secured-enterprisey version of Android, rather than doing their 'not invented here'. They could had 30% of market by now. Doubt it. People don't care about security. If people cared then other companies would just bother to release security updates and try to actually harden android.

kebolio 10y ago

Echoes the sale of the ThinkPad to Lenovo...

amenghra 10y ago

BlackBerry had a fine product for a specific market segment until the press/media started comparing them to consumer devices. What if they had focused on what they were good at?

bdcravens 10y ago
There were plenty of consumers buying Blackberries. As sales contracted, most companies will try to regain that, as opposed to admitting defeat and refocusing on core competencies, especially when you're publicly traded.
pwthornton 10y ago
It eventually became a point where the iPhone was a better consumer and professional device. The Blackberry simply wasn't a real smartphone with a real OS.
- wNk6A23YB 10y ago
  The iPhone is not a better professional device than a BB OS device from an organizational standpoint. For instance as an MDM administrator you can't control the OS version of company devices other than saying it must be within a range for the device to connect to company resources. This creates a risk that users will update the OS before a required app supports the new version. You also can not capture SMS/iMessage data which leaves regulated industries needing third party solutions which are not carrier agnostic (eg Smarsh). Apple is slowly catching up with features like DEP, VPP, and supervised mode but it has a long way to go.
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tacostakohashi 10y ago
They did. They just weren't as good at that as everybody else.
poopsintub 10y ago
They were ruling the world until smartphones without keyboards became cheap. The demand for a tactile keyboard shrunk to India and a bunch of old men and women running the government. Now they don't even use them anymore.

JohnTHaller 10y ago

I'd still pay good money for an Android phone with a proper landscape slide out keyboard. Think an updated G1/Dream or G2/Desire Z but with a nice 5"+ screen and top tier specs.

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nailer 10y ago

BlackBerry owns a bunch of patents around Elliptic Curve Cryptography [1] - since they own Certicom [2]. Maybe they're going to troll as a business model? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECC_patents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECC_patents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry_Limited#Certicom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry_Limited#Certicom

erichocean 10y ago
And yet they don't seem to apply[0] to what may be the most widely used ECC library, NaCl[1]. So maybe they're not really worth much... [0] http://cr.yp.to/ecdh/patents.html http://cr.yp.to/ecdh/patents.html [1] https://nacl.cr.yp.to/ https://nacl.cr.yp.to/
- nailer 10y ago
  Thanks re: [0]! Re [1] wouldn't openssl/boringssl/etc be the most widely used ECC library? Most people are using ECC with older style non-Edwards curves, also openssl has curve25519 in the next major release. NaCl seems to only do newer algos according to https://nacl.cr.yp.to/securing-communication.pdf https://nacl.cr.yp.to/securing-communication.pdf - what software uses NaCl now? Thanks!

_Codemonkeyism 10y ago

I was a Blackberry user and evangelist vor many years (keyboard shortcuts made me very productive and the old Blackberies were built like tanks). Then I've got a Passport, which is the crappiest phone I've ever had. I did love the swipe to mail, message hub, scrolling keyboard and keyboard. Reception was so bad to render it unusable. It fell to the ground from hip level and had a cracked board. "Android" compatibily never worked for me as most software I've tried to use needed Google Play services which were a pain to maintain and install.

sxcurry 10y ago

On mobile trends: "The most exciting mobile trend is full Qwerty keyboards. I'm sorry, it really is. I'm not making this up." Lazaridis, May 2008. Almost Trump-like in his dogged grasp of fantasy.

eumenides1 10y ago

BB's strong suit isn't software or hardware. It's semi-competent at both. BBM is amazing and BB10 OS is pretty amazing (name a phone that can multi-task now, i.e. play youtube and write an email). But it also has lots of stinkers. The keyboard is pretty rocking, devices can take a beating, but BB has various hardware issues. Battery pulling to solve problems etc. Now that they are going android, nobody knew that the world could only support 2 phone ecosystems as opposed to 3, i think they need to leverage the strengths. Keep making the excellent software, cut the chafe (BB virtual keyboard, BB Hub, BBM, etc). Also they have should leverage their hardware group and make excellent and robust android phones. 1. keep making the BB Classic using android OS. People want it. 2. Make phones that are robust. People want phones that can be beat up, 3. Make android phones that have better than 2 years of support. iPhones support 3-5 years which is amazing compared to android. I want to buy an android phone that i don't have to throw out every 2 years. They have excellent devs that could extend the shelf life of older android versions or just BB phones.

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hobbes78 10y ago
Even my cheap Android phone allows writing an email whilst watching a YouTube video: http://imgur.com/a/s9MpE http://imgur.com/a/s9MpE It's a Galaxy A5 (2016) and it's a fraction of the price of a Galaxy S7 or iPhone 7...

gcb0 10y ago

as an owner of an Android black berry, i say they are killing the wrong side. the hardware is still good (Android phone with slide out keyboard where each key has capacitive touch sensors) the software not only is pure garbage, it keeps getting worse with each update. if blackberry did open hardware, and released all specs so we could have true open Android phones, it would dominate the market as the pc clones dominated the computer market of the past.

ultrasaurus 10y ago

I was at the (only?) Blackberry store in New York. They had some nice looking phones, but the magic was gone.

protomyth 10y ago

I was pretty excited about the concept[1] (maybe not the exact execution[2]) of the keyboard on the Passport. It seems like there was still a place for BlackBerry but the chasing Apple doomed them[3]. 1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNVT95S6_eE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNVT95S6_eE 2) I would have preferred more keys 3) from the book https://www.amazon.com/Losing-Signal-Extraordinary-Spectacular-BlackBerry/dp/1250060176/ https://www.amazon.com/Losing-Signal-Extraordinary-Spectacul...

phodo 10y ago

This is out of the Sega playbook https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega

aziraphale 10y ago

Anyone who did Blackberry development back in the day, before OS 10 and Android, knows why they're now in this state. It was an abysmal experience, and they either didn't care or didn't understand the importance of keeping developers onside once Apple and Google started taking market share. Code-signing servers that were down on a regular basis, sometimes for days, which meant you couldn't deploy your app to real hardware. Simulators that took 5-10 minutes to start up and had no hot-reloading. God knows how many different system configurations that you were expected to support, with different screen sizes, bit-depth, input devices, internet connectivity (they used to offer mobile data plans which would only connect to "approved" services), etc. No official developer support beyond the sparsely-populated community forums. It was just horrible. Then when something finally did click it was far too late (by at least 5 years) to improve their own ecosystem, hence the jump to Android. I have very little sympathy for them now. You reap what you sow.

avh02 10y ago
Man, I'm always surprised there aren't more pissed off BB developers. It was a horrible experience, and I agree that it's their stubbornness and unwillingness to improve and go all the NIH-syndrome that ended them up here. If anything, their hardware wasn't bad, it's their software that was rotten.

Fej 10y ago

How is BlackBerry going to pivot? Does anyone actually care about their software? Don't Apple, Google, and Samsung provide "good enough" enterprise services? If so then I really don't see what their plans are.

anmorgan 10y ago
They also have QNX. http://www.qnx.com/content/qnx/en.html http://www.qnx.com/content/qnx/en.html

pcollinsmokonut 10y ago

"BlackBerry confirms it will stick to its knitting as a patent troll"