Are Robust BlackBerry Devices Hindering Their Future Growth

BlackBerry is widely known for its rugged hardware and impenetrable software. But the company is still lagging behind in the market. Its new offerings have failed to meet the standards set by the company’s previous products. Even after a year of its launch, BB 10 products are selling less than the legacy devices of BlackBerry. There are several theories behind the drastic failure of a once great company.

A large number of experts believe that the company is a victim of a lackluster marketing campaign. Its marketing efforts lack the stimulation factor carried by the companies like Apple. Others believe that the lack of support from network partner is the main cause behind the failure of the company. However, that cannot be all. Focusing on BB10 products, it is unrealistic to imagine that faithful BlackBerry users will transition to a new, hitherto untested BB10 OS. BlackBerry OS has years of solid history behind and comes with robust features like BIS services.

Though BB10 has failed to impress the markets, but it is still too early to judge the potential of the operating system. The software is still evolving and seems to have good potential ahead. But BB10 has yet to generate any significant revenue.

If you look a little deeper, you will notice one telling difference between BlackBerry users and iOS/Android users. Apple and Samsung fans invariably tote the latest models, whereas a vast majority of BlackBerry users still stick to BBOS and legacy devices. One major reason behind this is the durability of the hardware. Most of the smartphones, including the top of the range ones like iPhone, are designed to give maximum 2 years of service. After this time period, their performance declines substantially, whereas robust BlackBerry devices keep working year after year.

So, is this a unique case of a company suffering due to the high quality of its phones? Apparently, this anomaly is true in BlackBerry’s case. In majority of the cases, new products cannibalize the existing products of a company. This is not happening in BlackBerry’s case. While it may seem as the testament of the company’s product superiority, it also harms its growth prospects. Since loyal BlackBerry users are not migrating to new products, the company is losing on revenue and margins.

On the brighter side, the old products are able to provide a cushion to BlackBerry, while it chisels its new products and services to perfection. The company seems to have identified the pattern and recognize it. Its CEO has now charted out different road maps for various divisions of the company. Under this strategy , BlackBerry is looking to have a multi-pronged approach where it looks to capture low end market with products like Z3, whereas it targets lucrative enterprise markets with state of the art devices like Q20.

Overall, it can be concluded that the robustness and durability of BlackBerry devices did hinder the adoption of newer devices. At the very same time, the company can use this edge to better market its products and capture market segments which favor functionality over fluff.