Tag: blackberry sales

BlackBerry Priv completes first weekend of sales

| November 11, 2015

This Android based smartphone may very well be the company’s last attempt at this type of device.

The BlackBerry Priv, the latest device from the struggling Canadian company and the first that is based on Google’s Android operating system, has now been on the market for its first weekend and the question has now been raised as to whether or not consumers have responded well and what it will mean for the future of the company.

CEO of the handset maker, John Chen, has suggested that this may be a defining product for the company.

Chen has previously indicated that whether or not the company will continue to make handsets may depend on whether or not the BlackBerry Priv ends up being successful. That said, by the time of the writing of this article, the company had not yet released its numbers with regards to the sales that it experienced during its first launch weekend. This device also represents the first time in years that the company has turned its attention to reaching out to mainstream audiences once again, instead of smaller niche markets.

The most notable difference in the BlackBerry Priv has to do with the Android operating system powering it.

Blackberry Priv SalesUntil now, the company has always used its own BlackBerry operating system. However, it is hopeful that by changing to the Android OS, it will become considerably more appealing to consumers who value a very large number of mobile app options for their devices.

John Chen has stated that it is vital that the hardware division at BlackBerry become profitable before the close of the current fiscal year, which will occur on February 29, 2016. If that does not happen, it is very likely that the company will choose not to continue to make smartphones and will redirect its attention to focus on its security software development.

Chen’s calculations state that in order to meet its goals to continue in hardware, the company would need to sell five million phones throughout the current fiscal year. That would be the break-even point. Considering that the company has already reached the halfway point in that time and it still needs to sell three million devices to reach that goal, it is clear that the future of that part of the company is highly dependent on the success of the BlackBerry Priv.

CEO John Chen unwavering in BlackBerry smartphone profitability goal

| May 22, 2015

He believes that the enterprise security features will set these handsets apart from the competition.

CEO John Chen has revealed that he is still pursuing his goal of returning BlackBerry smartphone sales to profitability, despite the fact that the company has only just managed to escape from the brink of complete disaster.

It is Chen’s belief that the mobile security in the company’s handsets are head and shoulders over other manufacturers.

Chen explained that when it comes to mobile security, there simply isn’t any comparison to a BlackBerry smartphone He said that they offer far greater security features on enterprise devices than is available on any other manufacturer’s gadgets. The CEO also went on to state that the smartphones made by BlackBerry function as a jumping off point for the company to be able to market its other broad range of security options.

While the company can secure Android and iPhone devices, Chen says that there is nothing like a BlackBerry smartphone.

Blackberry Smartphone - Profitability GoalThe CEO explained that Android smartphones and iPhones can have their mobile security levels enhanced through BlackBerry technology, but that when it comes down to it, the highest level of protection is available through one of the company’s own handsets. This belief helps to explain why Chen has chosen to adhere to his intentions of moving forward within the device business in order to focus on other components of the mobile industry.

He also explained that the U.S. Army is continuing with “rolling out all BlackBerry,” and he added that if he should “tell them there are no more phones, I lose that account. The question is how do you make phones profitable at the volume those people represent?”

During the most recent quarterly earnings announcement, the handset maker from Windsor, Canada, revealed that it had 1.6 million devices within that span of time. Though this number is certainly only the smallest sliver of the mobile technology market as a whole (Apple’s equivalent figure was 61.2 million), it does help to show that the BlackBerry smartphone does appear to be hanging in there when compared to previous recent quarters.