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Saturday, March 31, 2012

RIM is still committed to the consumer market... like there was ever any doubt

Mark Bridge writes:

There are times I feel like turning my back on the mobile phone industry and joining a monastery. That’s probably not going to happen, given the monks’ tradition of not admitting wives. But yesterday was another of those frustrating occasions. Let me tell you why.

Poor old RIM. It’s been through a rough patch. In fact, it’s in a rough patch right now. BlackBerry sales haven’t been going as well as expected.

So what’s it going to do?

It’s planning “to refocus on the enterprise business”. That’s the phrase CEO Thorsten Heins used. He said the company can’t be all things to all people, so it’ll build on its strengths and go after targeted consumer segments. It’s likely to scale back its consumer-oriented value-added services business.

And it’s going to stop selling phones to consumers.

Oh, hang on, no. No, he didn’t say that.

So why did we end up with headlines reading BlackBerry firm quits consumer race and BlackBerry giving up on the consumer market, along with news stories asking “I've just agreed a 24-month contract. Will I be affected?”.

I can only guess. People being in a hurry to write a story, people looking for an online headline that’ll generate plenty of clicks, people not bothering to read the announcement or listen to what Mr Heins actually said...

...and perhaps RIM should have made things clearer. Anyway, it now has.

The company has issued a statement that says “To be really clear, we are fully committed to the consumer market. In fact, we are aggressively focusing on delivering a unique and compelling user experience to all of our customers to enhance the way people engage, produce content, and manage data via mobile computing.”

It goes on to say RIM will be focussing on parts of the consumer market where BlackBerry excels, commenting that it’s uniquely positioned to deliver a smartphone for personal and professional use.

Which is pretty much what it said in the first place.

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Opinion Articles

Everything Everywhere, Orange and T-Mobile: how much longer for three brands?

Mark Bridge writes:

This story starts with Mercury One2One and Orange. They were acquired by Deutsche Telekom (which changed One2One’s name to T-Mobile) and France Telecom. Next, Everything Everywhere was created to run the T-Mobile and Orange brands in the UK.

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Multiplayer Computer Games are Big Business for Small Devices

Greg Flakus of voanews.com writes:

Millions of people are addicted to playing games on mobile devices, with rivals and teammates spread around the world. A company in Austin, Texas has developed such a game, known as a mobile multiplayer online game, for the Apple iPhone and iPad, basing it on a pen-and-paper game that was popular in the 1970s called Traveller.

Author: The Fonecast
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Last week at The Fonecast: 30th April 2012

Mark Bridge writes:

Last week mobile phones and health were back in the headlines together, rather like love & marriage or salt and vinegar. The news is pretty much as we’ve heard before; this time it’s the UK Health Protection Agency’s independent Advisory Group on Non-Ionising Radiation telling us there’s no convincing evidence that mobile phone technologies cause adverse effects on human health – but longer-term research is still needed.

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Big headlines for Three UK... but no big changes

Mark Bridge writes:

The headlines sound pretty dramatic. “Three exits business market”. “Three parts company with Phones 4u”. It sounds like the 3G network operator is cutting back and reorganising. But let's look a little closer.

Author: The Fonecast
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Last week at The Fonecast: 23rd April 2012

Mark Bridge writes:

We’ve had a few sets of quarterly results in the past week. Let me summarise as best I can.

Qualcomm: doing very well, thank you.
Microsoft: pretty decent, although no-one’s talking much about phones.
Intel: not as good as before, although better than expected.
Nokia: sorry, we’ve lost a billion Euro. Well, we did warn you...

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Recent Podcasts

Reviewing our 2015 mobile industry predictions... and looking forward to 2016

Podcast - 15th January 2016

Iain Graham, James Rosewell and Mark Bridge return to review their mobile industry predictions from last year. Which mergers, partnerships and developments did they forecast correctly... and which didn’t work out as planned?

Later in the programme, the team anticipates some of the topics that will be hitting the headlines during 2016.

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Podcast from Mobile World Congress 2015

Podcast - 6th March 2015

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Looking back at February: from security scares to multiple MVNOs

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We're taking a look back at the biggest mobile industry news stories from February 2015, including allegations that the UK's security service tried to breach SIM card security by hacking into one of the world's biggest SIM producers.

We also talk about the planned BT and EE merger, the creation of two new UK virtual networks, some acquisitions in the mobile payment arena and a new Ubuntu smartphone.

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Interview with Chris Millington of Doro about mobile retailing, wearables and technology for older consumers

Podcast - 24th February 2015

In today's programme Mark Bridge talks to Chris Millington, who's Managing Director for Doro UK and Ireland.

They discuss the state of mobile retailing in the UK, the future of wearable devices and - as you might expect - smartphones for seniors.

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A month of mobile: O2 counts on 3, Microsoft counts to 10 and Apple counts its profits

Podcast - 30th January 2015

We're back with a month of mobile industry news, including takeover talks and takeover rumours. O2 and Three are said to be discussing a merger... but is there any truth in the suggestions that BlackBerry could be up for grabs?

We also discuss Apple's record-breaking quarterly figures, the highlights of CES and the launch of Microsoft Windows 10, as well as saying farewell to the current version of Google Glass.

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