1. cbvinh's Avatar
    Many people have complained that BlackBerry has been pricing the new BB10 phones too high. Could the pricing be a tug-of-war between the consumers department and enterprise department within BlackBerry, with the enterprise department winning out? My guess is that BlackBerry has been going after the enterprise market all along and was hoping to sell BB10 phones at a premium. If they lowered the prices for the consumers market, then they would lose out on some fat margins corporations would be willing to pay for. This, to me, would explain the pricing.

    Your thoughts?
    10-11-13 04:04 PM
  2. BigBadWulf's Avatar
    The phones are sold through the carriers.
    10-11-13 04:24 PM
  3. cbvinh's Avatar
    The phones are sold through the carriers.
    So then it would be the carriers trying to cash in on the enterprise market and as a consequence, ruining BlackBerry?

    Somebody along the sales chain thought that they could sell at the high pricing and when that didn't happen, the prices "couldn't" be dropped. Even Apple, on the original iPhone release, dropped the price by 1/3 only 11 weeks after release since they were after a certain sales target. Why couldn't BlackBerry do the same? They have relationships with the carriers.
    10-11-13 06:36 PM
  4. BigBadWulf's Avatar
    Not sure why you think the Enterprise sales prices are high, or how you could conclude BlackBerry has carrier leverage. I do know VZW dropped their contract pricing for BB10s.
    10-11-13 07:34 PM
  5. len pothier's Avatar
    The idea that it is all Carrier pricing is wrong.

    BlackBerry Black Z10 - ShopBlackBerry.com

    BlackBerry Z10 (Unlocked) - Black

    $449.00

    Straight from Blackberry's own website.

    BlackBerry Z10 - Black cell phone from AT&T

    Regular Price
    $339.99
    AT&T is $50 cheaper and the only advantage to the one you buy from Blackberry is that it is unlocked, granted it will cost you $75 to unlock an at&t bb10 through crackberry but the $25 you save is hardly a huge amount.

    I think there is at least some truth to the OP's thoughts, unfortunately enterprise is not biting like I think Bbry expected.

    At this point I feel like bbry should have had all 4 of their phones available at launch with the Q5 and z10 priced as "entry level" devices intended for the mass deployments across large scale business/government use with the q10 and z30 being the "high end/flagship" devices that are used by management etc. as it was they released what they called a flagship phone in the z10 first and then superceded it within a few months by the q10 and then the z30 following on. Had they of done that, and marketed the platform properly, then we could have seen even more adoption of BES10 which after all is what Bbry wants, their handsets to me are not an end unto themselves, rather a means to an end, selling software and services to enterprises. I think their consumer position has always been a bit odd and not something they ever understood even at its height. The only reason they were able to lead in that area imho was a near complete lack of competition. I mean who else did email on the go, palm, iirc that was pretty much it. Add to that the keyboard which made texting a reality, lets not forget how painful it is on feature phones.

    So in that regard their "prosumer" nonsense makes a bit of sense, unfortunately that same market that "just wants a device to get things done" can get that from an iphone or android, bbry no longer has the market cornered in that regard. Plus on the side of all that is the fact that all those bbos7 etc devices that are out there are still getting things done. I mean those that have stuck with those devices up to this point are probably pretty hardened in their ways. They like the devices, they understand them and they don't see a need to upgrade, even to bb10, especially when al;l they read about is how everything has changed etc.

    Okay so that went off in a completely different direction, sorry about that just had those thoughts in my head for the past few days.
    cbvinh likes this.
    10-11-13 08:09 PM
  6. BigBadWulf's Avatar
    BlackBerry selling for less than the carriers they sell to, will do nothing but hurt them, both short term and long term.
    10-11-13 08:21 PM
  7. len pothier's Avatar
    Maybe, maybe not. Google does it with the nexus line. I know they are different. But it can be done. Everytime I see and have seen bbry they seem to view themselves as premium handsets but unfortunately the general market does not share that view. Ultimately I doubt bbry is selling devices to carriers at much less than 250 a piece on the z10. It is in the carriers best interest to sell the phones. All of the press says they arnt selling so if that is the case why are prices not lower unless of course they can't make a profit any cheaper.

    Posted via CB10
    anon8091350 likes this.
    10-11-13 08:43 PM
  8. Troy Tiscareno's Avatar
    Google does it with the nexus line.
    Google also does virtually ZERO marketing for their Nexus phones. They do market the Nexus tablets a bit, but the phones rely on the tech press and general Google/Nexus interest from consumers in order to sell.

    Consider that the Nexus 4 has sold 4-5 million phones in the 10 months or so that it's been available (it sold out and launch and was effectively off the market for 2 months), which is more than BB10 has sold with all of its advertising AND widespread carrier availability. The Nexus 4 is available from a small handful of carriers (only T-Mobile in the US), and is mostly sold direct from the Play Store, full price and SIM-unlocked.
    BigBadWulf likes this.
    10-11-13 11:43 PM
  9. heymaggie's Avatar
    Blackberry simply does not have the volume to be anything but a premium priced product. Can you expect to develop and maintain a platform with 1/20th the sales volume to support the fixed platform costs?
    BigBadWulf likes this.
    10-11-13 11:50 PM
  10. noelcwoodward's Avatar
    The phones are sold through the carriers.
    Phones aren't sold by carriers everywhere

    Posted via CB10
    10-12-13 12:24 AM
  11. donmateo's Avatar
    Carriers subsidize their phones because it lures people in and they make considerable amounts of money off each phones services. When I upgraded my 9900 to Z10 I was charged a $36 upgrade fee even though my contract was up. BlackBerry doesn't need to and can't afford to lessen the price of phones because that is the end of the line for them (assuming consumer base) , whereas a carrier gets service fees.

    Posted via CB10
    10-12-13 12:58 AM
  12. locke7's Avatar
    BlackBerry selling for less than the carriers they sell to, will do nothing but hurt them, both short term and long term.
    Dude you need to stop bolding all your comments. When I read them I feel like I'm listening to someone extremely angry and or completely unhinged...

    Posted via my Q10.
    cwalt2166 likes this.
    10-12-13 01:43 AM
  13. len pothier's Avatar
    Carriers subsidize their phones because it lures people in and they make considerable amounts of money off each phones services. When I upgraded my 9900 to Z10 I was charged a $36 upgrade fee even though my contract was up. BlackBerry doesn't need to and can't afford to lessen the price of phones because that is the end of the line for them (assuming consumer base) , whereas a carrier gets service fees.

    Posted via CB10
    That would be true if the handset business was able to drive sales but it isn't. As I said for bbry the handsets are not the goal but rather the route. They sell handsets to get companies onto bes and previously for a service fees they would get from bis. The individual hardware sale is small compared to the longer term revenue that can be made through their services business imho, and that is what they are now saying they want to focus on more the service side of things since afaic that route has several advantages:

    1) the revenue stream from it is much more even than handsets. With handsets you will almost always get a nice bump at launch which then slows, the rate of which from what I can see for bbry is drastically, leaving them with little income until the next launch. On top of that as we seen from the z10 writedown the initial demand is not there like it is others.

    2) offering enterprise level solutions is comfortable for them, they understand that demographic way better than they ever did the consumer one. It will also help focus what little marketing they do towards a target audience. Corporate it departments also don't change device/server policy with their shirt the way the consumer market does.

    All I all doing what they are doing is imho the right thing, the real questions that remain are is it too little too late and and will they even have enough time to implement this and turn things around. At this point I'm not sure they will, I think they are a couple of years too late to make this work. Bb10 really was a bonzai move if it worked then it would give them more room to manouver and change if it didn't then their cash reserves would continue emptying until there was nothing left...

    Posted via CB10
    10-12-13 04:29 AM
  14. cbvinh's Avatar
    Not sure why you think the Enterprise sales prices are high, or how you could conclude BlackBerry has carrier leverage. I do know VZW dropped their contract pricing for BB10s.
    I imagine enterprise would buy on volume and that means pricing the phones higher so that even with volume pricing, BlackBerry (or any other company) would make a healthy profit. Also, businesses tend to be charged more because it is business. Take for example airline ticket prices for business class versus economy. Sure, business class is nicer, but is it 5+ times better?

    BlackBerry has touted their carrier relationships as one of their strong points.
    10-12-13 04:39 AM
  15. cbvinh's Avatar
    It is in the carriers best interest to sell the phones. All of the press says they arnt selling so if that is the case why are prices not lower unless of course they can't make a profit any cheaper.
    I don't think BlackBerry did deals like Apple, where a carrier is committed to buy X dollars of phones over Y years, e.g. Sprint and Apple's deal of $15 billion dollars worth of phones over 4/5 years. BlackBerry appears to be supplying phones as carriers sell, and at this point, carriers could care less. The carriers face no repercussion if they don't sell BB10. I still think BlackBerry's price to carriers is more than cost plus a little profit. I imagine they left some room in there to lower the profit margin. They did report something like a 40% margin?
    10-12-13 05:00 AM
  16. cbvinh's Avatar
    BlackBerry doesn't need to and can't afford to lessen the price of phones because that is the end of the line for them (assuming consumer base) , whereas a carrier gets service fees.
    BlackBerry did report a very healthy profit margin of something like 40% per phone. Given they needed volume to attract developers, they could have lowered the margin to 20% to gain traction and build newer phones with better margins.
    10-12-13 05:05 AM
  17. cbvinh's Avatar
    That would be true if the handset business was able to drive sales but it isn't. As I said for bbry the handsets are not the goal but rather the route. They sell handsets to get companies onto bes and previously for a service fees they would get from bis. The individual hardware sale is small compared to the longer term revenue that can be made through their services business imho, and that is what they are now saying they want to focus on more the service side of things since afaic that route has several advantages:

    1) the revenue stream from it is much more even than handsets. With handsets you will almost always get a nice bump at launch which then slows, the rate of which from what I can see for bbry is drastically, leaving them with little income until the next launch. On top of that as we seen from the z10 writedown the initial demand is not there like it is others.

    2) offering enterprise level solutions is comfortable for them, they understand that demographic way better than they ever did the consumer one. It will also help focus what little marketing they do towards a target audience. Corporate it departments also don't change device/server policy with their shirt the way the consumer market does.

    All I all doing what they are doing is imho the right thing, the real questions that remain are is it too little too late and and will they even have enough time to implement this and turn things around. At this point I'm not sure they will, I think they are a couple of years too late to make this work. Bb10 really was a bonzai move if it worked then it would give them more room to manouver and change if it didn't then their cash reserves would continue emptying until there was nothing left...

    Posted via CB10
    With the huge write-off of Z10's, someone suggested in another thread that BlackBerry could give those away to enterprise BES licensees. That could be a shift that could turn it around for their enterprise market and get them back to what they know.
    anon8091350 likes this.
    10-12-13 05:09 AM
  18. len pothier's Avatar
    With the huge write-off of Z10's, someone suggested in another thread that BlackBerry could give those away to enterprise BES licensees. That could be a shift that could turn it around for their enterprise market and get them back to what they know.
    It could but if they faced an uphill battle before I feel it will be twice as hard now, the excitement of launch is not there this time around. It is an interesting idea, I'd say sell the devices at cost to those willing to upgrade to bes10 and all the early adopters. I also think long term they should offer discounts on the hardware for those running it through bes, stop treating companies like cash cows and milking them for money and they might be more open to your solutions. if companies feel like they are paying a premium for a 'regular' level device when they can go out and get an iphone or android for the same money which for them works just as well where is the pitch coming from?

    I just feel they have backed themselves into a corner now and to get out is going to take more than they have left.

    Posted via CB10
    10-12-13 07:25 AM

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