[imz]

The way I see it...

The BlackBerry CEO Thorsten heins will gladly sell the company off in bits and pieces to whoever is willing to buy. He doesn't care if "BB10" succeeds, that's the vibe I get, I may be wrong but it doesn't look like he sees much hope in the company or platform.

The Former CEO Mike, probably sees potential in the company and would like another crack at it with one of the other founders of BlackBerry. I cannot see it being all about "money", this is a guy who has invested hundreds of millions locally, given so many millions away, he's not a guy who's scrapped for cash that he's chasing to cover his shares, unlike Prem Watsa, who is accountable to his Fair fax shareholders, Mike... is accountable to no one.

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[fin2007]

Being impatient can destroy a really good product. BB10 will only get better with time in my opinion.

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With Linux/Andriod OpenSource, you have all the smart people in the world help you to get it better every day.

But with BB10, nobody else is going to help you except yourself.

The gap could only get bigger and bigger.

[Omnitech]

Anyone can change their thinking, so if Mike buys BlackBerry he can learn from his mistakes and be successful. At least you know he would want to see it succeed.

"Wanting to see it succeed" and "having the ability to make it succeed" are two very, VERY different things.

What BlackBerry has historically missed in the smartphone market is a leadership and corporate culture that UNDERSTANDS the consumer marketplace. TH was certainly better than Lazaridis and Balsillie, but not good enough.

Apple's recent successes can be distilled to a large extent to PRECISELY that particular skillset which Steve Jobs possessed. He understood the consumer market and his target customer, he had the ability to envision and anticipate how to evolve his products in important new ways that hadn't been done before, he was absolutely driven and passionate about his company and making it succeed, and he was fanatical about product quality and constantly pushed his staff to improve it.

BlackBerry's legacy corporate and government business in some ways probably hogtied them because they were leery of "upsetting the applecart" there even while attempting to appeal more to the individual technology customer, and I'd imagine that their corporate culture wasn't really built around the kind of fickle and trendy "fashion industry like" mentality that pervades the mass market individual tech business these days, so they never fully wrapped their heads around how to build products to succeed in that market.

As part of that cultural problem, I'd been saying for years that they needed some female input on their products and culture, so they go and hire Alicia Keys as a figurehead who basically does nothing while getting paid a bunch of money? (While sending out Blackberry-related tweets from her iPhone?!?)

What they SHOULD have done is hire someone like Marissa Mayer as CEO or VP or something, and some young people with fresh ideas, instead of all the in-house fuddy duddies. They went and bought TAT which was a great move, then proceeded to ground all of their best ideas and marginalize them within the company, to the point that the key people from TAT have now left and formed their own company again. (When I saw an interview earlier this year with a boring Canadian guy and longtime RIM employee who was presented as their "head of UI" or somesuch, it solidified my prior worry and gut feeling that TAT had been sidelined.)

In a nutshell, the "solution" to BlackBerry's problems is not a simple one, nor is it likely that simply flipping back to an already questionable CEO choice is going to magically solve anything.

What the company needs more than anything, IMHO, is the financial resources to make a useful stab in the marketplace before the opportunity completely closes, but I just don't see any likely proposals that could make that happen. What Watsa or Lazaridis will probably end up with is a much smaller company which cannot hope to compete in the general consumer marketplace any more. Maybe in a best case scenario they could try to build it up again, but even if that works it will be several years before they could be a force in the mass market again, I would think.

[kevinnugent]

So why not Laziridis, Fregin and Watsa? That's 26% of the company there if the 16% figure is correct.

Obviously Watsa has a different vision of the future for Blackberry than Mike L has.

[BravoZuluDelta]

With Linux/Andriod OpenSource, you have all the smart people in the world help you to get it better every day.

But with BB10, nobody else is going to help you except yourself.

The gap could only get bigger and bigger.

I'm surprised the pkgsrc thread hasn't gotten more traffic; perhaps it's the title. The OP is fielding the idea of using the collection of open source packages available to *NIX and *BSD operating systems to build applications for BB10. We're POSIX compliant and the vast collection pretty much covers everything up to and including "mobile computing" solutions. This is out of my area of expertise so unfortunately I can't go anywhere with pkgsrc.

EDIT: Here's the link - http://forums.crackberry.com/develop...-10-os-857820/

[Omnitech]

I'm surprised the pkgsrc thread hasn't gotten more traffic; perhaps it's the title. The OP is fielding the idea of using the collection of open source packages available to *NIX and *BSD operating systems to build applications for BB10. We're POSIX compliant and the vast collection pretty much covers everything up to and including "mobile computing" solutions. This is out of my area of expertise so unfortunately I can't go anywhere with pkgsrc.

EDIT: Here's the link - http://forums.crackberry.com/develop...-10-os-857820/

All POSIX compliance gets you is a certain amount of command, binary and filesystem compatibility, and maybe a character-based UI.

Since BB10 has no default user-accessible console (and you wouldn't want a console-based app anyway) and no built-in X-server to display an X-Windows version of such apps, I really don't see what the value in that would be.

The newly-improved Android subsystem already built-in to the OS is a far, far more useful mechanism to get useful apps on the platform than trying to port a bunch of POSIX apps that were never meant to be used on a handheld device anyway.

[lnichols]

Wow I remember when we were all so happy that Mike L and Jim stepped down and Thorsten took over. The two guys who watched Rome burn around them were out. Now that Mike L's hand picked successor has done nothing but throw BB10 over the wall and expect the users to sell it for them while he would collect 55 Million for doing nothing, people are cheering for one of the co-Nero's to return to save BlackBerry! Strange and desparate times here at CrackBerry.


BTW I still believe that this has been the plan all along and Mike L thinks the BlackBerry would have been just fine if it weren't for those pesky investors that expected them to perform and this was his plan to eliminate the investors from the equation while F'ing them over in the process. Way too many coincidences and friendships among the key players in the current series of events IMHO.

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[xandermac]

Way too many coincidences and friendships among the key players in the current series of events IMHO.

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It is shady.




Twitter: xandermac

[kbz1960]

I'd argue that his "vision" made smartphones what they are today.

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How do you get that? His vision was great years ago and that's where they stayed, back in years ago.

[danprown]

We know Mike L already tried to steal $250 MM from the shareholders by backdating options (as a lot of other CEOs did in those days), so it is not out of the question.

However, it would just seem such a risky plan to drive your puppy into the ground so you can pick what -- the carcass -- to sell... MDM fror enterprises for $60 MM per quarter?!

Wow I remember when we were all so happy that Mike L and Jim stepped down and Thorsten took over. The two guys who watched Rome burn around them were out. Now that Mike L's hand picked successor has done nothing but throw BB10 over the wall and expect the users to sell it for them while he would collect 55 Million for doing nothing, people are cheering for one of the co-Nero's to return to save BlackBerry! Strange and desparate times here at CrackBerry.


BTW I still believe that this has been the plan all along and Mike L thinks the BlackBerry would have been just fine if it weren't for those pesky investors that expected them to perform and this was his plan to eliminate the investors from the equation while F'ing them over in the process. Way too many coincidences and friendships among the key players in the current series of events IMHO.

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[southlander]

Isn't this the same guy that didn't want full touchscreens said they would fail and didn't want bb10 and screw the consumers they'll never catch on,?

Sent from my HTC One

I guess. People can change their views. It's not like most anyone here knows the fellow. Has he said recently that everything he ever has been quoted having said -- he still believes 100%? We'll have to judge by actions if this comes to fruition.

Z10STL100-4/10.2.0.1767

[grunt0300]

I'd argue that his "vision" made smartphones what they are today.

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His "vision" is MONEY.

[Just Me]

In any case, I agree that the right focus was/is the consumer market despite the protestations of many here. It was always going to be tough against GOOG and AAPL but I think they could have done it with the right people in place. If TH did the best he could, what about the CTO and CMO?

TH did a fantastic job focusing the company and delivering a product. He could still be doing a fantastic job but the board turned his focus to packaging the company for sale. Trim jobs, write down stock and make the company an acquirable size and price.

The CMO did nothing. Superbowl add and Aleisha Keys amount to less than a 200k salary in my book. He was a board appointment the could be a puppet when they were ready for the sale. No comment for the CTO, BlackBerry has never had a problem producing devices, their issue currently lie in the selling and promoting areas.


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[Omnitech]

...their issue currently lie in the selling and promoting areas.

While those are definitely problem areas, there are also serious problems with execution/late delivery, and software quality.

[grunt0300]

The way I see it...

The BlackBerry CEO Thorsten heins will gladly sell the company off in bits and pieces to whoever is willing to buy. He doesn't care if "BB10" succeeds, that's the vibe I get, I may be wrong but it doesn't look like he sees much hope in the company or platform.

The Former CEO Mike, probably sees potential in the company and would like another crack at it with one of the other founders of BlackBerry. I cannot see it being all about "money", this is a guy who has invested hundreds of millions locally, given so many millions away, he's not a guy who's scrapped for cash that he's chasing to cover his shares, unlike Prem Watsa, who is accountable to his Fair fax shareholders, Mike... is accountable to no one.

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IMHO...You are being "taken in", by Mike's philanthropy. He's writing off millions in tax free investments, and looking like a "good guy". As you yourself stated...Mike is accountable to NO ONE. There's an old saying...You have to spend money, to make money. That's his bottom line, but a lot of people here at Crackberry, just don't want to see it. People are grabbing at straws, hoping against hope, that BB will survive. AT WHAT COST? If there's more money to be squeezed out of BB, Mike will find it. What will the BB user get in return? In the end, BB may be just another android company. A "mini me" of HTC, Samsung, etc. Let go, and choose another platform, any platform. I would use "The Force", before i would use BB again.

[needforbbx]

TH did a fantastic job focusing the company and delivering a product.

A bit of an overstatement. IMHO.

[Killington]

I would use "The Force", before i would use BB again.

Awesome line btw.

As far as your point 'at what cost?' No cost to me. Shareholders might get screwed, not the people who bought the devices -- they'll continue to work even if BB shutter its doors.

If BB is sold and the new owners, whomever they may be, are determined to remain in the handset business, then the chances that Android would be adopted while dumping BB10 is option of no resort. You're happy with with Android and I'm happy with BlackBerry. No amount of force will change either of our views.

[Just Me]

Very quiet on this front right now. What happens if Mike tables an offer? Will it be considered only after shareholders vote on Prem's offer?

[Knightcrawler]

at this point i don't think an offer is coming from anyone.

[Just Me]

at this point i don't think an offer is coming from anyone.

Valuable insight.

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