[bhrgvr]

Say we make BlackBerry10 free to manufacturers for devices smaller than 4.5 inches. Would it increase market share? We can remove some features like BBM, Docs to Go with editing facility? Get more people to use the OS and get them addicted to? What say guys?

Posted via CB10

[Elite1]

Do you mean by licensing the BB10 OS to third parties for their brand(s) of smartphone?

What you're suggesting, BBRY is hoping to accomplish with the upcoming Z3. To date they have expressed no significant interest in licensing out BB10, and seem dedicated in controlling hardware themselves/

[bhrgvr]

Do you mean by licensing the BB10 OS to third parties for their brand(s) of smartphone?

What you're suggesting, BBRY is hoping to accomplish with the upcoming Z3. To date they have expressed no significant interest in licensing out BB10, and seem dedicated in controlling hardware themselves/

Exactly... the license is free if they make something less than or equal to 4.5 inches. so in effect this will be like Android with limited features like no BBM and no docs to go. Buyers can download BBM for a nominal fee? The moment they make something bigger than 4.5 the standard licensing fee , whatever it might be, will come into being.

Posted via CB10

[Troy Tiscareno]

Why would a manufacturer choose a stripped-down BB10 OS, even for free, when it has a negative brand image and a poor ecosystem, when they can choose Android for free, and have access to the biggest app store in the world, and have apps that would be compatible with a range of Android tablets, car stereos, smartwatches, and more? Which do you suppose would sell to consumers?

If BB10 had been released in 2009-2010, licensing it to other OEMs might have been a viable strategy, but today's battle isn't the OS, or the phone hardware, as much as it is the ECOSYSTEM, and BB simply can't compete there.

[nycspaces.]

stripping out bbm, you sound like the original management team. they are giving it away for free on ios and android.

your thought of expanding the base is smart but stripping away features makes no sense. the gated garden is what killed RIM. hopefully Chen can fix it

Posted via CB10

[skibnik]

BlackBerry has already made a deal with Foxconn to manufacture new BB10 phones the Z3 being the first model. So licensing is moot.

Z30 and loving it!

[badiyee]

Say we make BlackBerry10 free to manufacturers for devices smaller than 4.5 inches. Would it increase market share? We can remove some features like BBM, Docs to Go with editing facility? Get more people to use the OS and get them addicted to? What say guys?

Posted via CB10

Not currently possible. Even with the Z3 being manufactured by Foxconn, BlackBerry actually dictates the overall design. All Foxconn does is take the quotation, design a phone (or many), and BlackBerry cherry picks from the list, and modify as necessary.


Another poster insinuated that the BlackBerry brand OS is in the gutters, therefore it is not a good move. However, if you look at a parallel of Nokia, they developed a heck lot of hack apps in order to make their Windows Phones more appealing.

Its not that BlackBerry did not went down the same path. Somebody in BlackBerry stopped all their creative workforce from unleashing all that, damming up all that floodgates.

[BB10user07]

Say we make BlackBerry10 free to manufacturers for devices smaller than 4.5 inches. Would it increase market share? We can remove some features like BBM, Docs to Go with editing facility? Get more people to use the OS and get them addicted to? What say guys?

Posted via CB10

Glad you came out of the cave.... jk

Posted via CB10

[BB10user07]

Why would a manufacturer choose a stripped-down BB10 OS, even for free, when it has a negative brand image and a poor ecosystem, when they can choose Android for free, and have access to the biggest app store in the world, and have apps that would be compatible with a range of Android tablets, car stereos, smartwatches, and more? Which do you suppose would sell to consumers?

If BB10 had been released in 2009-2010, licensing it to other OEMs might have been a viable strategy, but today's battle isn't the OS, or the phone hardware, as much as it is the ECOSYSTEM, and BB simply can't compete there.

Troy inverse of you would make a great spokesperson for BlackBerry

Posted via CB10

[co4nd]

And how are they going to make money off that?

[RyanGermann]

...or this

Troy inverse of you would make a great spokesperson for BlackBerry

Maybe our Troy IS the "Mirror Universe Troy". I should have noticed before: the facial hair is the mark of "Mirror Universe"!

[bhrgvr]

Not currently possible. Even with the Z3 being manufactured by Foxconn, BlackBerry actually dictates the overall design. All Foxconn does is take the quotation, design a phone (or many), and BlackBerry cherry picks from the list, and modify as necessary.


Another poster insinuated that the BlackBerry brand OS is in the gutters, therefore it is not a good move. However, if you look at a parallel of Nokia, they developed a heck lot of hack apps in order to make their Windows Phones more appealing.

Its not that BlackBerry did not went down the same path. Somebody in BlackBerry stopped all their creative workforce from unleashing all that, damming up all that floodgates.

This came after I read someplace that MS is not charging anything for the OS if any manufacturer makes a phone less than 5". I will try and get a link for it.

I don't think that bb10 is in the gutters and I completely agree that BlackBerry under TH did a horribly wrong job of making the OS acceptable. They bought TAT and let it go waste.

Posted via CB10

[bhrgvr]

Here is the link I am talking about... it is from BGR but it got me thinking...

http://bgr.com/2014/04/02/microsoft-...nference-news/

Posted via CB10

[sixpacker]

Troy inverse of you would make a great spokesperson for BlackBerry

Posted via CB10

Maybe they should have hired him in 2008 and they wouldn't be in this pit?

[RyanGermann]

Maybe they should have hired him in 2008 and they wouldn't be in this pit?

You are right they would be in a completely different pit.

My high hopes for BB10 were dashed after I got my Z10: it wasn't everything you love about BBOS and more, it was lots of things you love about BBOS are not there, and there are some new things to love, but what you love about iOS and Android are also not there. What BB is doing now is to recognize that they can't really compete on what it is about Android and iOS that people love (which is APPS APPS APPS) and they're at LEAST trying to integrate what people love about BBOS.

I do not agree that what people love most about Android and iOS is the innate capability of the OS: they love the apps (including those by Apple and Google that are proprietary to their platform). I believe that a lot of what BlackBerry fans love about BBOS is intrinsic to the OS, not the apps. Where one draws the line on where the OS ends and the Apps begin is part of the debate, but fundamentally, it's the OS and how the OS gathers up all the communications into a central messaging UI and allows for similar functionality and UX to be present across different communications platforms is why BBOS still has a significant following, and why iOS and Android as yet don't fully appeal to those people. Android and iOS could probably go more fully in that direction (and no, unified notifications isn't far enough) and if BlackBerry doesn't work fast on bringing BB10 to feature parity with BBOS, then their most significant competitive advantage will be lost.

So, BB lovers love their OS, Android and iOS users love their apps and tolerate the OS. Getting App lovers to love the OS and getting OS lovers to love Apps is the chasm... a chasm that is narrower now that BB10 can run Android Apps, but without the full suite of Google services, BB10 can never completely close the chasm, and unless BlackBerry can ape all the functionality provided by the proprietary apps on Android by Google or on iPhone by Apple, BB10 can't have the same appeal.

Dig?

[early2bed]

Making you OS free is an ecosystem play. You have to have some kind of software, service, ads, or whatever to offer all those users who aren't buying your hardware. Better yet, it helps if you aren't in the hardware business yourself so you don't have to take the hit of helping to create your own competition.

[Troy Tiscareno]

Maybe they should have hired him in 2008 and they wouldn't be in this pit?

LOL. Perhaps.

I remember when Steve Jobs originally announced that the iPhone wasn't going to be open to outside developers, and that devs should be building Web Apps instead, and I said "how can such a brilliant guy make such a STUPID decision?" Of course, we all know that he quickly changed his mind, and set Apple to work in making APIs for devs to write native iPhone apps and building the App Store.

The point is: even in 2007, I well understood that the power of a computer product was NOT so much in the hardware or the OS, but in the ecosystem of apps, services, and add-ons. Most people didn't love Windows, so why was it popular? Not because the hardware of the devices it ran on - most people bought cheap junk. It wasn't because the OS was great - few loved it, most tolerated it, and some outright hated it. But there were millions of apps, and millions of peripherals and accessories that all worked with Windows. Aside from a handful of Mac apps or Mac hardware, virtually all apps and add-on hardware worked with Windows, and were available on Windows first. That is what made Windows #1 on the desktop.

Had I been running BB, my primary focus would have been on building an ecosystem that was both wide and deep, because that is what would have sold my phone products, more than anything else.

Unfortunately, BB's culture has always been top-down (Mike is always right) and xenophobic, with no real effort to make it easy or convenient for partners to get on board. Even for a company for whom security was important, that just makes no sense.

BB tried to compete on the consumer market while focusing on priorities that only mattered to a small niche of users (corporate security). It's not any kind of a surprise that their strategy failed; that's the only possible outcome. And now, BB is so small that it can ONLY focus on a couple of niches, and worse, the two niches couldn't be any more different: emerging market consumers are the polar opposite from mature-market enterprises when it comes to what they find important, and so BB has to try to manage two completely-opposite sets of focus with almost no customers in the middle to act as a cushion.

That's why the release of Stickers seemed so out-of-touch in mature markets - people were thinking: why would Enterprise care about this crap? And enterprise developments are going to seem out-of-touch to BB's emerging market consumers - "why don't they gives us things that WE want?"

Unfortunately, BB is in such a bad financial situation that they have no choice but to do their best to serve these two niches - they're the only places where BB has any hope of substantial success, having ignored for WAY too long all the things that the general consumer finds important, and having driven those consumers into other brands. That was a colossal mistake for a market leader to make.

[Tatwi]

I would buy an HTC One or Sony Xperia with BBOS10 in a heart beat. Tough choice between the two, but likely take the waterproofing and Gorilla Glass on the Xperia.

[cgk]

Exactly... the license is free if they make something less than or equal to 4.5 inches. so in effect this will be like Android with limited features like no BBM and no docs to go. Buyers can download BBM for a nominal fee? The moment they make something bigger than 4.5 the standard licensing fee , whatever it might be, will come into being.

Posted via CB10

or they go with WP which is license free, comes with real office, an actual ecosystem behind it and a big daddy behind with actual cash.

[anon(1464249)]

Licensing the OS is a viable option if and only if they get the Android Runtime to run every app in the Android store smoothly and provide a gateway to the Google Play store.
Either that or they will need to start populating BlackBerry Appworld with Android apps fast.

A lot of if's but I have a feeling Chen is considering this scenario quite vividly in his head as a backup in case the Z3 fails. He has already stated that BlackBerry needs to return to it's roots and maybe become a software/services company...

[bhrgvr]

Licensing the OS is a viable option if and only if they get the Android Runtime to run every app in the Android store smoothly and provide a gateway to the Google Play store.
Either that or they will need to start populating BlackBerry Appworld with Android apps fast.

A lot of if's but I have a feeling Chen is considering this scenario quite vividly in his head as a backup in case the Z3 fails. He has already stated that BlackBerry needs to return to it's roots and maybe become a software/services company...

They will need Google Play service to run all those apps. I doubt BlackBerry is going to pay the extra cash to Google for the play services.

The problem with going back to root is that the market there is very very small. Becoming a software and services company is not going to be an easy task too.

Posted via CB10

[anon(1464249)]

They will need Google Play service to run all those apps. I doubt BlackBerry is going to pay the extra cash to Google for the play services.

The problem with going back to root is that the market there is very very small. Becoming a software and services company is not going to be an easy task too.

Posted via CB10

True, I also fail to see the incentive Google has to license their Play Services to BlackBerry.

[anon(832122)]

They will need Google Play service to run all those apps. I doubt BlackBerry is going to pay the extra cash to Google for the play services.

The problem with going back to root is that the market there is very very small. Becoming a software and services company is not going to be an easy task too.

Posted via CB10

It isn't just about paying Google the extra cash. OEMs must run a compatible version of Android (open handset alliance) which obviously bbry will not do because it would make them just another Android phone producer.

I know people here on crackberry love the Android runtime but it is a very poor bandaid to bbry's lack of apps problem.

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