Originally Posted by
CarlJF It's not a security violation. many companies have used, and still use this strategy. Just think of Amazon and the Kindle, which is sold at lost or at cost. One of the best known example is GM, selling their cars at lost for years only to keep their #1 positions as a car maker...
That said, I agree with you that it's not a viable long term plan. In the case of RIM and the PB, they may guess that it may be easier to sell a BB10 device to someone buying a PB now than if this someone is rather buying an iPad or Nexus. Actually, RIM is in a position where they have to do anything they can to keep what customers they still have until the BB10 launch. Anyway, nobody expects the company to make any profit until then. And if BB10 is a fail, the loses from the PB will just be irrelevant. On the other hand, if BB10 is a success, RIM will rapidly regain the losses by selling PB10 phone to these additional PB owners. Something you may have a hard time to do if you had let them buy an iPad instead of a PB...