There's a number of stories about the insane level of hubris at RIM. Before the iPhone smartphones were seen as "business" phones. RIM reportedly felt like hot

There's a number of stories about the insane level of hubris at RIM. Before the iPhone smartphones were seen as "business" phones. RIM reportedly felt like hot shit because they had managed to just not fuck up while Palm, Microsoft, and Nokia tripped over themselves to try to make a BlackBerry But Better. RIM was so focused on the "business" market they really couldn't conceive of a real consumer device. Their upper management apparently looked at the billions of feature phones sold (IIRC Motorola had sold a quarter billion RAZRs by then) and said "nah let's double down on the order of magnitude smaller business market". They dipped their toe in feature phones with the Pearl but it was a joke compared to the original iPhone with its original software that didn't even support MMS. By starting with more consumer friendly features (Web, media player, phone features) Apple had an extremely competent baseline of functionality. As soon as they added workable Exchange integration (iOS 3 or 4?) the iPhone (including older models) instantly became workable business devices. RIM had far more ground to make up for going from business to consumer than Apple had going consumer to business. https://archiveprod.canadianbusiness.com/technology-news/how-management-has-failed-at-rim/ https://archiveprod.canadianbusiness.com/technology-news/how... https://techland.time.com/2013/09/29/the-inside-story-of-the-collapse-of-blackberry/ https://techland.time.com/2013/09/29/the-inside-story-of-the... https://sites.psu.edu/global/2018/02/09/blackberry-and-the-impact-of-resistance-to-change/ https://sites.psu.edu/global/2018/02/09/blackberry-and-the-i...