[Rickroller]

Do they really?

It's actually a debatable point. What if they merely didn't lose money on the PlayBook, even after taking everything into account (like the higher margins on the 32 and 64GB, the App World revenues, accessories, etc)?

What if they merely broke even on the PlayBook (or made or lost a little... not important for my argument) but they used it to support the BB10 phone in the market, both before and after their introduction? And made lots of money on those...

Didn't they already lose almost $500million in write-down losses on the PB? So at this point, it's about recovering some of that, or not losing anymore imo. Everyone knows the Kindle Fire is selling at a loss because they want people jumping into their ecosystem, which in return, will make them money. RIM doesn't quite have this luxury yet, and taking a gamble in hopes that people will buy BB10 devices 10 months from now is a big one.

I think at this point, RIM is "all-in" so to speak. They can't really up the prices much on the PB, but at the same time they need to get these things into the public hands. So they can only continue selling these at a loss, in hopes that people will buy their new line of phones. But continually pumping money into (what could be) a losing venture, could spell big trouble for them.

[Rickroller]

This is a welcome change from the usual RIM bashing going on.

Yea, imagine that. When RIM actually puts out something that, as the article states, is "useable", and not just promises of "Coming soon", tech writers have nice things to say.

[pantlesspenguin]

Yes but could you if you didn't have BES or BIS? I think not. Neither will an android or iphone owner.

It might be a fluke, but I have my berry set up on AT&T prepaid. I was told that BIS would indeed work on prepaid. Then suddenly my BIS functions stopped working.........unless I was connected to wifi. I took the phone to AT&T and they told me I was misinformed and BIS really didn't work on prepaid. Somehow I had gotten BIS service on it, but then when the AT&T computers refreshed it showed I was receiving something that wasn't possible so it shut down. That's just what I was told by an AT&T rep, so I have no idea how accurate that really is.

[pantlesspenguin]

BB Phones and Playbook are the ultimate mobile pair.

But for those WITHOUT berries who want a Playbook, the Playbook should be the ultimate complete tablet.

[emirozmen]

Okay but come on... what tablet in the world releases without the native email and contacts application!? Now that we are having these features shouldn't seem that much of shock!

[peter9477]

Didn't they already lose almost $500million in write-down losses on the PB? So at this point, it's about recovering some of that, or not losing anymore imo.

Again, I don't know that it has to be "about that". I think it's about getting to the phones, and making obscene profits on the phones (well, or a reasonable margin anyway), and if the plan works out well they'll recover the PlayBook losses down the road, as a minor side effect of making masses of money on the phones.

I'm not saying they wouldn't still be trying to tweak the pricing structure, eke out a few more bucks and try slowly to increase the margin... they'd be stupid not to. I just don't see it when someone says they "have to make lots of money on the PlayBook", or "they can't go on losing money on the PlayBook" (especially when we really have no idea if, aside from that one-time write-off, they actually are losing on it).

The RIM top management has clearly been taking a very long term view of things, for which as an investor and developer, not to mention customer, I'm very thankful. If they followed conventional short-term thinking and ran from short-term risk and losses, they'd be out of business by now, or sold and broken up for the parts. The PlayBook would no longer exist and we wouldn't be having this discussion.

[TheScionicMan]

They didn't total all the costs of the PlayBook creation and production and then subtract sales figures to come to that loss number. There could be a ton of accounting gimmicks they used to come that number. They could be eating a little more now to make the future numbers work out. We really don't have enough details to draw conclusions. It's funny that some people have locked onto that so hard...

[cbvinh]

I mean the version of anything that comes out always needs some tweaking . I mean look at the first iPhone and the first iPad. Now we have iPhone 4s and iPad 3 right around the corner. people seem to forget about the first ones that hit the market and the changes that were needed to get where they are today. Never heard a bad word about Apple and theirs needing improvements. How can anyone compare a PB to a iPad 2 anyway. So lets see where RIM takes this on to the next level. I use a BB torch 9800 and I am holding off as bad as I hate to wiring on the OS10 devices because I can just feel it in my bones they are going to be super

First iPhones didn't have Apps, MMS, cameras, cut & paste, wallpaper, pseudo-multitasking, etc. The first iPad didn't even include a camera when its smaller brethren did.

I agree, lets see where RIM takes the Playbook. OS2 adds the needed native email, contacts and calendar. If anything, the unified nature of it, along with filtering, makes it even better than most other implementations.

[cbvinh]

But for those WITHOUT berries who want a Playbook, the Playbook should be the ultimate complete tablet.

I would consider the Playbook with native email, contacts and calendar as complete as any other tablet for those features.

BBM would have to be something extra. RIM doesn't look like it can make money from Playbook hardware sales, so it can't afford to offer BBM for free, like iMessage for iOS products. Perhaps non-BB owners can have BBM for $5-10/month. At least RIM would make money on servicing the Playbook and those without BB can have the option of joining in.

[TRlPPlN]

although i agree on some points that BBM doesn't need to be on the PB, it shouldn't be left out as part of it's integration down the road. Yes bridge+bbm works. But IT WOULD BE NICE if it was native and actually support group chats along with emoticons character support. Some of us wouldn't mind kicking back with our PB and chatting on BBM group chat. Again, it would be a nice option. BB is known for BBM as well. so why not have it native on the PB??

[Unsure2]

Do they really?

It's actually a debatable point. What if they merely didn't lose money on the PlayBook, even after taking everything into account (like the higher margins on the 32 and 64GB, the App World revenues, accessories, etc)?

What if they merely broke even on the PlayBook (or made or lost a little... not important for my argument) but they used it to support the BB10 phone in the market, both before and after their introduction? And made lots of money on those...

Sure, the money doesn't need to be made directly from the Playbook; if RIM can use it to sell phones, or movies if that video store gets off the ground, that would do just as well. But, RIM cannot afford to go on losing five hundred million dollars a year on the Playbook. Even if the company could afford that kind of loss, which is dubious, its shareholders aren't going to allow that to continue.

[brucep1]

This os 2.0 looks really special. As I have been critical of RIM as of late, I will be the first to praise it if it runs as flawlessly as it was depicted in Kevin's video.

My opinion on RIM goes from positive to negative depending on the year. 2006-2008 I was very happy for the most part with the way they innovated and the products they made. From 2009 to 2011, I was definintely critical with the products they made, the horrendous customer support, and the failure to innovate. Hopefully, 2.0 is a sign of things to come and 2012 will be a much better year.

[soyamilk.soyamilk]

RIM isnt giving up on its playbook and is now using it as a strategic tool. Having a poor start and the lack of follow through, they have nothing left to lose for the playbook. The playbook is now the "QNX testing ground" for blackberry 10, hence the delay of the next gen phones.

[Angelo_Campher]

I agree that BBM must somehow be implemented on the PlayBook for those who don't have BlackBerry phones. It is very much part of the BlackBerry experience...

[pantlesspenguin]

I agree that BBM must somehow be implemented on the PlayBook for those who don't have BlackBerry phones. It is very much part of the BlackBerry experience...

I completely agree. I believe that purchasing a Playbook should be the same as purchasing any other blackberry device with the same capabilities. Yes, the bridge function is really cool and very useful...but on the other hand people who buy iPads, Android tablets, Touchpads, etc don't need a separate device to get more functionality out of their tablet. I completely understand that BIS is necessary for security, etc and it may not be applicable on a WiFi tablet, but your *average* consumer will only care about the functionality or lack thereof.

[taylortbb]

But, RIM cannot afford to go on losing five hundred million dollars a year on the Playbook.

The thing is that's not what happened. It was a non-cash writedown, and that's the important part.

What you seem to be thinking is it cost RIM $X to make the PlayBooks, and they managed to sell them for $Y. The difference is $500 million, they spent $500 million more making them than they sold them for. That's not what happened.

What happened is that RIM had a pile of PlayBooks in inventory. They said on their balance sheet "These PlayBooks are worth $A based on selling them at 500/600/700". Then it turned out they could only sell them for 200/300/400, and suddenly the value of their inventory dropped by $500 million. Loss of value in inventory is considered a business loss, but it doesn't mean they lost money. If the new price is still more than it costs to build then they still turned a profit.

In the specific case of the $199 16GB I do think they're losing money. But I think the $299 32GB and $399 64GB were probably still profitable, looking just at hard production + distribution costs. R&D costs are difficult because the OS is also the next gen phone OS. Without knowing a bunch of secret internal data we'll never know the exact answer to how much RIM has made or lost. My point is that they didn't spend $500 million more than they made.

[brucep1]

The thing is that's not what happened. It was a non-cash writedown, and that's the important part.

In the specific case of the $199 16GB I do think they're losing money. But I think the $299 32GB and $399 64GB were probably still profitable. Without knowing a bunch of secret internal data we'll never know the exact answer to how much RIM has made or lost. My point is that they didn't spend $500 million more than they made.

Without knowing the actual cost of the R and D that went into the Playbook, you can't really make an assumption that they made money on any of the models. Also, if the R and D money was used for developing the phone software too. Killing two birds with one stone, if you will.

[doxa sub750T]

I would consider the Playbook with native email, contacts and calendar as complete as any other tablet for those features.

BBM would have to be something extra. RIM doesn't look like it can make money from Playbook hardware sales, so it can't afford to offer BBM for free, like iMessage for iOS products. Perhaps non-BB owners can have BBM for $5-10/month. At least RIM would make money on servicing the Playbook and those without BB can have the option of joining in.

This comment makes a lot of good business sense. Why RIM should give it away when selling PB at the current discounted prices, where all of us who can use BBM need to pay. Well, only time will tell how things unfold.

[taylortbb]

Without knowing the actual cost of the R and D that went into the Playbook, you can't really make an assumption that they made money on any of the models. Also, if the R and D money was used for developing the phone software too. Killing two birds with one stone, if you will.

I was speaking simply to hardware production and distribution costs. I'll edit to make that clear. R&D is almost certainly a loss if it was just for the PB, but given it's also the next gen OS for phones that's a bad way to look at it.

[CDM76]

I agree I could care less about native bbm but it seems to be one of those sticky points many bring up.

People feel the 'need' to complain about SOMETHING ! Aurgh.

If you have a BB phone you have BBM on your PB.
If you dont have a BB phone why would you want / need BBM on your PB ? I can think of much more productive things RIM should be spending its time working on.

[CDM76]

I agree that BBM must somehow be implemented on the PlayBook for those who don't have BlackBerry phones. It is very much part of the BlackBerry experience...

So then you MUST buy a BB phone. Simple.

[auditman]

bis bbm work over wifi. when i dont have signal on my 9780 i connect to wifi and continue to use bbm.

[pantlesspenguin]

So then you MUST buy a BB phone. Simple.

I pointed this out earlier in this thread: do people who buy iPads, Touchpads, Android tablets, etc need to buy a separate phone to make their tablet fully functional? Nope. I think buying a Playbook should be seen as buying a stand-alone blackberry device, complete with its own PIN. RIM should get out of the mindset that Playbooks should JUST be for current BB users. That's their downfall in the tablet market, IMHO. Playbooks and ALL of its functionality should be available for EVERYONE that wants one!

[kbz1960]

I agree that BBM must somehow be implemented on the PlayBook for those who don't have BlackBerry phones. It is very much part of the BlackBerry experience...

They will in a 3g or 4g playbook.

[Snap51]

Very positive review from Melissa J. Perenson at PCWorld also