[icedkermit]

I believe BlackBerry is focusing too much on trying to generate a positive net income and not enough on expanding its BB10 user base. If the initial price of the Z30 in the UK reflect its actual launch price, BlackBerry isn't going to sell many of them and are going to end up writing off several million dollars of inventory. Instead, they should give the the first 1 million Z30 phones away for free, increase the BB10 user base and hopefully create some positive momentum behind the phone.

[pttptppt]

That's like having Krispy Kreme give out 1 million free donuts. It'd be amazing but never would happen

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[Andrew4life]

Why would I pay for something that was given out for free?.... is what the 1,000,001th customer should say.



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[tlegend2012]

You are in business to give things for free?

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[sergey_IL]

500$ will be a good price.

[donmateo]

BB can only give dealers/carriers an MSRP...the price set is up to the companies that sell the BBs. It's illegal for BB to mandate pricing. Price Fixing is a federal crime under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.

[Fnord]

I believe BlackBerry is focusing too much on trying to generate a positive net income and not enough on expanding its BB10 user base. If the initial price of the Z30 in the UK reflect its actual launch price, BlackBerry isn't going to sell many of them and are going to end up writing off several million dollars of inventory. Instead, they should give the the first 1 million Z30 phones away for free, increase the BB10 user base and hopefully create some positive momentum behind the phone.

Hindsight is 20/20

Somehow don't see this buisness model really taking off....

[icedkermit]

Judging from the comments above, no one here really understand business.

Under normal circumstances, there's no way BlackBerry should be giving away phones. But BlackBerry isn't operating under normal circumstances.

The two choices are NOT 1. Sell phone or 2. Give Phone away. The choices are instead 1. Give cash to vendors to settle purchase obligations BlackBerry is unable to fill or 2. spend same amount of money on phones and give them away. Ending cash balance is the same, but the trajectory of the installed base is much different.

More simply put, BlackBerry is going to lose several million dollars. They can do this by giving it to vendors or to users. At least if they give it to users, there's a chance they spend more in BB world, inspire their friends/colleagues to get one, etc.

[AnimalPak200]

You can't give it out for free or it will be laughed at as 'worthless ' (technically correct)... Instead, taking the hit by substantially lowering the price of several more million units would probably be a better strategy.

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[Fnord]

Judging from the comments above, no one here really understand business.

Under normal circumstances, there's no way BlackBerry should be giving away phones. But BlackBerry isn't operating under normal circumstances.

The two choices are NOT 1. Sell phone or 2. Give Phone away. The choices are instead 1. Give cash to vendors to settle purchase obligations BlackBerry is unable to fill or 2. spend same amount of money on phones and give them away. Ending cash balance is the same, but the trajectory of the installed base is much different.

More simply put, BlackBerry is going to lose several million dollars. They can do this by giving it to vendors or to users. At least if they give it to users, there's a chance they spend more in BB world, inspire their friends/colleagues to get one, etc.

In most parts of the world BB doesn't deal directly with their user-base - so how did you envision they give them away (sidewalk booths?)?

More to the point, would you walk up to a Wallstreet broker and say that with the market the way it is chances are you going to lose money, so why not give it to me and in turn I'll tell some people to use your services in the future. Win win.

[icedkermit]

You can't give it out for free or it will be laughed at as 'worthless ' (technically correct)... Instead, taking the hit by substantially lowering the price of several more million units would probably be a better strategy.

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This phone will be worthless rightly or wrongly. It's not going to sell as its priced on par with newest iphone and samsung. BlackBerry doesnt sell to consumers directly. They sell to carriers who then sell to consumers. My point is an obvious over simplification, but essentially BlackBerry would be better off giving away 1 million phones for free than just writing off the purchase order. No carrier is going to say no to it. And at least it would increase the BB10 installed base and generate ancillary revenues from BES10, BBWorld, BBM Channels, etc.

[icedkermit]

In most parts of the world BB doesn't deal directly with their user-base - so how did you envision they give them away (sidewalk booths?)?

More to the point, would you walk up to a Wallstreet broker and say that with the market the way it is chances are you going to lose money, so why not give it to me and in turn I'll tell some people to use your services in the future. Win win.

To my knowledge, BlackBerry doesn't deal directly with consumers anywhere in the world. It's only through carriers. Not sure I fully follow your analogy, but my point is a framing/perspective issue - If you frame the question as "do you want to lose money", the answer is obviously no. If you frame the question as "assume you're going to lose money, do you want to give it to people who make your phones via a cheque or to the people who use your phones via free product" - I think the answer is fairly obvious.

[icedkermit]

BB can only give dealers/carriers an MSRP...the price set is up to the companies that sell the BBs. It's illegal for BB to mandate pricing. Price Fixing is a federal crime under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.

I'm not sure you fully read my comments. I make no reference to BlackBerry telling carriers what they should sell the phone for. I'm saying they would be better off giving it away than to write it off.

[fromlid]

If I were an existing longstanding Blackberry customer and I heard that they were giving the phones away for free then I would absolutely demand that I be among the ones to get them free. If I were a large government customer, I may even have a most-favored-nation clause that entitles me to the best price. So you'd better be prepared for me to get mine free - devices that I would have otherwise paid for. If you plan to give those free smartphones just to new customers then you need to think again.

[cbvinh]

There's no need to give it away free. There's a threshold price at which people would be willing to spend X dollars to see if it would suit them.

Examples:

1. Apple set a really high price for the first iPhone. They dropped the price by $200 after 11 weeks. Early adopters didn't get $200 back. They got $100 in store credit.

2. HP did a firesale on the TouchPad. Prices on eBay were higher. HP adjusted their pricing on later batches to match the eBay prices.

[donmateo]

I'm not sure you fully read my comments. I make no reference to BlackBerry telling carriers what they should sell the phone for. I'm saying they would be better off giving it away than to write it off.

Did I quote you in my comment? No...so I wasn't directing my comment at you.

[icedkermit]

There's no need to give it away free. There's a threshold price at which people would be willing to spend X dollars to see if it would suit them.

Examples:

1. Apple set a really high price for the first iPhone. They dropped the price by $200 after 11 weeks. Early adopters didn't get $200 back. They got $100 in store credit.

2. HP did a firesale on the TouchPad. Prices on eBay were higher. HP adjusted their pricing on later batches to match the eBay prices.

I'm not saying give every phone away for free.

[ljfong]

Simply aiming for lower margin will help a lot to regain mindshare, but then Thorsten will not get his $55 million dollars on buyout (cause the company will actually succeed?) so I suppose it will not happen. There are people who are working hard at the company improving the OS and giving out leaks, improving the built-in apps, and such, but unfortunately, those people seem to have no say whatsoever on the direction of the company.

[qcbarry25]

Judging from the comments above, no one here really understand business.

Under normal circumstances, there's no way BlackBerry should be giving away phones. But BlackBerry isn't operating under normal circumstances.

The two choices are NOT 1. Sell phone or 2. Give Phone away. The choices are instead 1. Give cash to vendors to settle purchase obligations BlackBerry is unable to fill or 2. spend same amount of money on phones and give them away. Ending cash balance is the same, but the trajectory of the installed base is much different.

More simply put, BlackBerry is going to lose several million dollars. They can do this by giving it to vendors or to users. At least if they give it to users, there's a chance they spend more in BB world, inspire their friends/colleagues to get one, etc.

lol. u must really understand business then coming up with such a great business model.

[amazinglygraceless]

I believe BlackBerry is focusing too much on trying to generate a positive net income

I...I mean...I don't even know where to start..

[Seijuro]

ahhhhh...creating threads and coming up with great ideas when drunk
don't worry about it, happened to many of us before

[nerdydaddyo]

Let me do the math. 1 million free Z30 s at roughly $800.00 a pop. Let's translate that into Krispy Kreme donuts. At $8.00 for a dozen (12), we need that one hundred times to equal one Z30 phone ($800.00) which is 1200 donuts, then times one million (1,200,000,000 donuts) at a cost of $800,000,000.00 for both companies. Put lightly...impossible.

I used my Z10 to create this CrackBerry madness!

[thatplaybookguy]

Did I quote you in my comment? No...so I wasn't directing my comment at you.

if you weren't directing it at him and its a thread he started then whom is it directed at or was it just a random comment in a thread. we all know about price fixing.

[Thunderbuck]

BB can only give dealers/carriers an MSRP...the price set is up to the companies that sell the BBs. It's illegal for BB to mandate pricing. Price Fixing is a federal crime under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act.

True as that is, there are many ways around it. No matter what, the lower the price they wholesale it at, the more the retailer can discount.

From the awesome PHYSICAL keyboard of my Q10

[icedkermit]

Let me do the math. 1 million free Z30 s at roughly $800.00 a pop. Let's translate that into Krispy Kreme donuts. At $8.00 for a dozen (12), we need that one hundred times to equal one Z30 phone ($800.00) which is 1200 donuts, then times one million (1,200,000,000 donuts) at a cost of $800,000,000.00 for both companies. Put lightly...impossible.

I used my Z10 to create this CrackBerry madness!

You're mistaking the selling price with what it actually costs. And you're not viewing this loss correctly. We can debate amounts but if we agree that bbry is going to lose, my point is that it's better to spend this loss on customers instead of suppliers.

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