Be like Facebook, not BlackBerry: How 'disruptors' can succeed

MANILA - Entrepreneurs with groundbreaking ideas need business-minded counterparts to ensure success, an analyst said Monday, as startups around the world aspire to become the next Facebook.

Mark Zuckerberg founded the world's largest social network as a Harvard dropout but found a management hand in chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg, said Ranjay Gulati, unit head of the Harvard Business School Organizational Unit.

Sandberg, who has an MBA from Harvard, is a former Google advertising executive who started out in the US Treasury. Zuckerberg got an honorary Harvard degree in May, 13 years after dropping out.

"What makes a great entrepreneur doesn't make a great scaler of business," Gulati told ANC's Early Edition.




Gulati said established businesses often struggle to compete with disruptors. He cited the former king of smartphones, BlackBerry, whose market share vanished as consumers ditched physical keyboards for touchscreen panels.

"They don’t know how to embrace change," Gulati said, adding BlackBerry's fault was "playing not to lose instead of playing to win."

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick resigned last month, under pressure from investors who demanded changes to the pioneer ride-sharing service's no-holds barred management culture.

Gulati said disruptors should be mindful of their corporate culture, adding, "In the end, culture is what comes back to bite you."

They should be able to empathize and "walk in the shoes of their customer," he said.

Disruptors should have a "bias for action" and be unafraid to fail, he said.

"The key word we have to think about is resilience. You're not going to get it right the first time. You have to have the resilience to keep trying, keep persisting," he said.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

BlackBerry's physical keyboard refuses to die with KEYone

BARCELONA - Chinese electronics company TCL unveiled Saturday its first BlackBerry-licensed smartphone which brings back the device's signature physical keyboard as it seeks to revive the once mighty brand.

The KEYone phone has a larger screen than previous BlackBerry devices and a fast charging battery as TCL sets its sights on businesses and tries to rekindle BlackBerry's strong reputation for productivity and security.

TCL reached the brand-licensing deal in December after the Canadian company announced that it would halt in-house production of smartphones, marking the end of an era for the once-dominant tech firm.

Under the agreement, BlackBerry will remain in control of software and security on smartphones, while TCL will handle creating handsets powered by Google Android software.

Officials from both firms unvailed the KEYone in Barcelona in northeastern Spain ahead of the start on Monday of the four-day Mobile World Congress, the world's largest annual phone expo.

BlackBerry worked closely with TCL to build security into the new device, said Alex Thurber, the general manager of BlackBerry's mobility solutions unit.

"At BlackBerry we live and breathe security. Security has been engineered into the entire manufacturing process, throughout the hardware and of course the software," he said.

BlackBerry's physical keyboard was one of the drivers of the popularity of its earlier phones but it was dropped once touch screens became popular.

The company in 2014 launched a "Classic" smartphone that brought back the keyboard but the device was discontinued in July.

In the new Blackberry phone, the keyboard can be used for more than just typing.

The spacebar on the keyboard also doubles as a fingerprint sensor while individual letter keys can be programmed as shortcuts to open speficic apps.

The KEYone will go on sale around the globe in April at a cost of 599 euros ($549).

"The new BlackBerry portfolio has a chance of success, because few companies now offer BlackBerry-style design and features, and the productivity-focused smartphone segment is underserved," said Ian Fogg, head of mobile at research firm IHS.

"Even if BlackBerry's smartphone share remains so low it is hard to quantify, the vast scale of the smartphone market -- over 1.5 billion units will ship in 2017 -- means even a tiny share would represent significant unit volumes and revenues," he added.

TCL said it would be coming out with new BlackBerry products later this year.

"What we are unveiling today is just the beginning of a new story," said TCL chief executive Nicolas Zibell.

BlackBerry once dominated the smartphone market but its luster faded after the introduction in 2007 of the Apple iPhone and the large number of low-cost Android devices that followed.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

BlackBerry offers iPhone users cash to switch to Passport

MONTREAL - Canadian smartphone maker BlackBerry is wooing Apple customers with a cash offer for trade-ins of iPhones for its new square-screened, keyboard-equipped Passport.

The promotion was announced late Monday and will be available starting next month until February 13, in Canada and the United States.

Customers who trade in their iPhones could receive up to $400 cash back depending on the model and condition of their trade-in, plus a $150 gift card.

This marks the first time that BlackBerry has gone head-to-head with Apple since the Canadian firm launched a turnaround plan last year aimed at stemming massive losses.

The Passport was launched in September.

Named for its approximate size to the travel document, the phone was designed to win back key corporate users after BlackBerry was effectively knocked out of the highly competitive consumer smartphone market dominated by Apple and Samsung.

Investors seemed pleased, pushing up the Waterloo, Ontario-based company's share price slightly in morning trading.

But analysts were more skeptical. Carl Simard of Medici called it a very "desperate move."

In September, BlackBerry reported it narrowed its loss in the latest quarter, and expressed optimism that its major restructuring and new business-friendly devices would help fuel a turnaround.

For the three months ended August 30, BlackBerry posted a loss of $207 million on $916 billion in revenues largely split between sales of services and software and more than two million smartphones.

The Canadian manufacturer pioneered the smartphone market but has struggled to keep up with competitors in recent years.

Last year, the company introduced the BlackBerry 10 operating system and new smartphones in an effort to regain ground lost to rivals such as Apple and others using the Google Android operating system.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

'Reports of BlackBerry's death are greatly exaggerated'

TORONTO - BlackBerry Ltd is "very much alive, thank you," Interim Chief Executive John Chen affirmed in an open letter on Monday in which the smartphone maker committed itself to rebuilding as a niche player concentrating on the enterprise market.

Chen took over as CEO a month ago after BlackBerry abandoned a plan to sell itself.

"Our 'for sale' sign has been taken down and we are here to stay," he wrote in the letter that was addressed to "valued enterprise customers and partners". The company provided the letter to Reuters.

"In short, reports of our death are greatly exaggerated."

BlackBerry, once the market leader in on-the-go email, has suffered a drastic loss of market share to Apple Inc's iPhone and devices powered by Google Inc's Android software. Its new smartphones have so far failed to win back customers, as Chen acknowledged in the letter.

"We know that BlackBerry devices are not for everyone. That's OK," he said.

BlackBerry has laid off thousands of workers over the last two years and in September it said it would shed more than a third of its global workforce and refocus itself on the enterprise market - large business and government clients - that vaulted it to prominence in the 1990s.

"We're going back to our heritage and roots, delivering enterprise-grade, end-to-end mobile solutions," said Chen, a turnaround artist with software maker Sybase in the late 1990s.

"The investments you've made in BlackBerry infrastructure and solutions are secure. I will keep the lines of communication open as we navigate through this transition."

BlackBerry shares were up 5 Canadian cents at C$6.76 on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Monday, just above the record low of C$6.25 hit two weeks ago, and at just a fraction of the stock's record high of C$150.30, hit in 2008, when the company dominated the smartphone market.

Rather than sell itself, BlackBerry said early last month it would raise $1 billion in a convertible notes offering led by Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd, its largest shareholder.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

BlackBerry unveils Z30 as new flagship smartphone

TORONTO - BlackBerry Ltd launched its new Z30 flagship smartphone on Wednesday, as it battles to win back market share despite uncertainty around its future.

Once a pioneer in the smartphone arena, BlackBerry said last month it was weighing options that could include an outright sale, in the face of lacklustre sales for its new devices that run on the BlackBerry 10 operating system.

The long-rumored Z30 device, which is first being unveiled at an event in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, will be BlackBerry's new top-of-the-line device, taking the crown from the smaller Z10 that was launched early this year.

The new touchscreen device, which boasts a five-inch display and a 1.7 gigahertz processor, will compete against the likes of Apple Inc's new iPhone 5S and Samsung Electronics Co's Galaxy S4, along with a slew of other devices that are powered by Google Inc's Android platform.

The company faces an uphill battle in generating interest in the new phone, however, given the lack of clarity around its future.

While the company has long aspired to make its BlackBerry 10 operating system the No. 3 smartphone platform in the market, the latest industry data indicates that Microsoft Corp's Windows Phone platform is in fact more likely to clinch that spot as its devices continue to gain ground.

Although the new line of BlackBerry devices has been well received by reviewers, analysts say the company lacks the financial heft to vie against industry giants like Apple, Google, Samsung and Microsoft, which boast massive marketing and R&D budgets.

Some analysts contend that Microsoft's move earlier this month to acquire Nokia's phone business and license its patents for 5.44 billion euros ($7.3 billion), poses another hurdle for BlackBerry, as the software giant is likely to redouble its catch-up efforts in the mobile device business.

But Waterloo, Ontario-based BlackBerry, which is set to report its fiscal second-quarter results next week, appears to be sticking with its product roadmap for now, even as it reviews its alternatives.

The company, which touts the Z30 as its "biggest, fastest and most advanced smartphone" to date, said the device will begin to hit store shelves in the UK and parts of the Middle East as early as next week.

The smartphone will go on sale with select carriers and retailers in other regions over the remainder of the year, said the company, adding specific pricing and availability will be announced by its partners at the time of their respective launches.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

Will BlackBerry go private?

BlackBerry Ltd is warming up to the possibility of going private, as the smartphone maker battles to revive its fortunes, several sources familiar with the situation said.

Chief Executive Thorsten Heins and the company's board is increasingly coming around to the idea that taking BlackBerry private would give them breathing room to fix its problems out of the public eye, the sources said.

"There is a change of tone on the board," one of the sources said on Thursday.

No deal is imminent, however, and BlackBerry has not launched any kind of a sale process, the sources said. Even if it tried, BlackBerry could find it hard to come up with a buyer and the funding to go private. With the company still posting losses and bleeding subscribers, private equity firms and other buyers may not want to step up.

The company's shares have fallen more than 19 percent this year. Its market value has fallen to $4.8 billion, from $84 billion at its peak in 2008.

BlackBerry, which had been pinning its hopes for a turnaround on its new line of BlackBerry 10 devices, declined to comment. The sources declined to be named because these discussions are private.

BlackBerry's openness to consider a deal marks a radical shift in thinking at the once high-flying smartphone maker. Until recently, BlackBerry, formerly known as Research in Motion and a pioneer in providing secured emails on handheld devices, had been bent on staying independent, betting its turnaround on its latest smartphones.

Last month, Heins said the company was on the right track and just needed more time to fix its problems. He said the company will unveil more devices that run on the BlackBerry 10 operating system over the next eight months.

The company has also been looking at options such as licensing its BlackBerry 10 software and other partnerships.

Waterloo, Ontario-based BlackBerry has recently had discussions with private equity firm Silver Lake Partners about potential collaboration in enterprise computing, one of the sources said.

Silver Lake is caught in a bruising $25 billion battle to take Dell Inc private. Should it succeed in the Dell buyout, one possibility could be for it to collaborate with BlackBerry in mobile computing, where the PC maker has struggled to gain traction, the source said.

The talks with Silver Lake did not involve any buyout or other transaction-related discussions, the source said.

Silver Lake declined to comment.

Pressure is only increasing on the smartphone maker. BlackBerry 10 sales have come in well below some analysts' expectations, raising questions about whether the company can quickly win back market share from Apple Inc's iPhone as well as Samsung Electronics Co Ltd's Galaxy devices and other phones powered by Google Inc's Android operating system.

Some investors say the company must now look at all of its options, from a sale of the whole company to a sale of parts. Its valuable patent portfolio and high-margin services business could draw interest from technology companies.

But private equity firms have circled the company for more than two years and have tried without success so far to figure out ways to structure a deal.

Moreover, Ottawa reviews any big takeover of a Canadian company for competitive and national security reasons. Government officials have often said they want BlackBerry to succeed as a Canadian company, but concede they do not know how things will play out.

source: www.abs-cbnnews.com

RIM plunges after grim quarterly report

NEW YORK — Research in Motion shares plunged Friday a day after the BlackBerry maker’s bleak earnings report and the delay in its new smartphone platform raised fresh fears about its survival.

RIM shares tumbled 19 percent to close at $7.39, their lowest level since 2003, and down more than 90 percent from their 2008 highs.

Analysts said the news from RIM was deeply disappointing — not only did the Canadian firm report a widening loss of $518 million, but it also said it would cut 5,000 jobs and delay its important BlackBerry 10 platform until early 2013.

The BB10 had been RIM’s effort — a last-ditch bid, according to some analysts — to regain traction after losing ground to Apple and smartphone makers using the Google Android platform.

“RIM’s prospects appear to be turning from bad to worse,” said Tal Liani, a research analyst at Bank of America/Merrill Lynch.

“In our view, the risk of total value destruction over the next few years is possible as at this point we cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

Other analysts said the price had fallen so low, that the company might extract some value by selling itself or parts of the company, such as its patents.

“With increased competition and a very low probability the market will support RIM’s new mobile computing ecosystem, we believe RIM will need to sell the company,” said Michael Walkley and the investment firm Canaccord Genuity.

He said the company could be worth $8 a share based on a “sum-of-the-parts analysis.”

A survey by the research firm IDC showed smartphones powered by Google’s Android software accounted for 59 percent of the global market in the first quarter of 2012, with 23 percent for Apple’s iPhones.

That left just 6.4 percent for BlackBerry, compared with 13.6 percent a year ago.

In the US market, only around five percent of smartphone buyers opted for BlackBerry in early 2012, according to a Nielsen survey.

source: interaksyon.com

Microsoft tie-up, network sale among RIM options: sources

NEW YORK — Research In Motion Ltd’s board is under mounting pressure to consider unpalatable options such as selling its network business or forming an alliance with Microsoft Corp after the Blackberry maker again delayed the release of its next-generation smartphones, said three sources familiar with the situation.

Shares in the Canadian company, which announced a steeper-than-expected quarterly operating loss on Thursday, plunged 18 percent in extended trading, slashing its market value to $4.1 billion. The stock has fallen about 70 percent in the past year.

RIM said the launch of BlackBerry 10 mobile devices has been postponed to early 2013 – more than a year later than initially promised – because the development of its new operating system had “proven to be more time-consuming than anticipated.”

The latest setback has increased pressure on RIM’s board to more seriously explore other options, including measures that would amount to an admission that it cannot survive by sticking to its current strategy, said the sources, who declined to be identified because the information was confidential.

One of these options is for RIM to abandon its own operating system and adopt Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 8. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer had approached RIM in recent months, looking to strike a partnership similar to the one the software giant has with Nokia Oyj, the sources said. Under that partnership, Nokia will use Microsoft’s latest Windows operating system on its smartphones.

In such a scenario, RIM could also look for Microsoft to buy a stake in the company and fund marketing and other expenses, the sources said. However, this option is not attractive to RIM because it would mean the end of the Waterloo, Ontario-based company’s technology independence, they said.

The RIM board prefers to see through the efforts to develop the new BlackBerry 10 operating system, according to the sources.

Microsoft could also be interested in RIM’s wireless patents, the sources said.

RIM and Microsoft declined to comment.

Another option for RIM would be to sell its proprietary network to a private equity firm or a technology company. The buyer could then open up RIM’s network operating centers to other smartphone providers, allowing them to also provide highly secured emails and other services to companies and government agencies, the sources said.

In that scenario, however, RIM’s device business is seen to have no future, they said, adding that private equity firms have been considering how to separate the hardware business from the network business.

RIM has in the past considered opening up its network to rivals, under a plan led by former co-CEO Jim Balsillie. That could offer RIM a way forward as demand for its BlackBerry phones faces fierce competition from Apple Inc’s iPhone and Google Inc’s Android phones.

The idea would be to clearly define the network as an asset that could exist without BlackBerry handsets – an operational precursor that could have led to a possible legal split if the handset business ultimately proved untenable.

RIM is “going to have to be much more open minded to the idea that Jim Balsillie was working on before he was ousted of opening their network to third parties,” said Eric Jackson, a hedge fund manager at Ironfire Capital in Toronto.

source: interaksyon.com

RIM and BlackBerry on the edge under new CEO

TORONTO/LONDON — The new leader at Research In Motion said on Monday the BlackBerry maker did not need seismic change, a declaration seized on by impatient investors who pledge Thorsten Heins will be an interim CEO if he does not turn RIM around in 12 to 18 months.

Takeover talk swirled around RIM as Heins took the helm at the struggling company, whose co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie finally bowed to investor pressure and resigned on Saturday.

In a conference call early Monday morning, Heins, who joined RIM in 2007 and was previously a chief operating officer there, said he would focus on a consumer push and a smooth delivery of its products, rather than allowing a churn of innovation to disrupt rollout, as in the past.

"We innovated while we were developing the product and that needs to stop," Heins said. "We need to innovate, don't get me wrong, but... when we say a product is defined and a product is a product, execution has to be really, really precise."

Still, the former Siemens AG executive hinted he would stick to the current strategy, saying the company needed scaling up, not a dramatic transformation. Lazaridis and Balsillie also gave up their position as co-chairman of the RIM board, but retained seats on the board, suggesting continuity was a goal.

"I don't think that there is some drastic change needed. We are evolving... But this is not a seismic change," Heins said.

The changes at the top of RIM did little to reassure investors. RIM's US-listed shares fell 6.4 percent to $15.90 in early trade on Monday.

Key shareholders and analysts alike signaled they are impatient for drastic improvement at a company that has lost market share and market value after being comprehensively outplayed by the likes of Apple and Google.

"If Thorsten really believes that there are no changes to be made, he will be gone within 15 to 18 months. He will be a transitional CEO and this will be a transitional board," said Jaguar CEO Vic Alboini, who leads an informal group of 16 RIM shareholders holding just under 10 percent of the company's shares.

Alboini criticized the retention of Balsillie and Lazaridis on RIM's board and called for several other board members to step down before the company's mid-year annual meeting.

"If we're wrong, prove us wrong," Alboini said in an interview, referring to the group of shareholders who support his view. "This group is not going anywhere. This is just putting RIM in a position where it might be able to get back into the game. It's early days."

RIM looks badly in need of a leader that can rejuvenate both the design and operational sides of the business or prepare it for sale to one of a raft of rumored buyers, its critics said.

"If there are no meaningful signs of an imminent turnaround then I think the spotlight will turn back on to the assets that RIM holds and who they might be attractive to," CCS Insight analyst Ben Wood told Reuters.

"The annual analyst event in May will now become the focal point to the unveiling of Thorsten's vision. We know the speed with which you make strategic changes and implement them is absolutely critical because the mobile phone business will not stand still."

On the surface, the former Siemens AG executive appeared to suggest he would stick to the current strategy, but analysts expect that to change in the coming months.

RIM's existing product lineup has struggled to compete with Apple's iPhone and iPad and the slew of large-screen and powerful devices from Samsung and other manufacturers using Google's Android operating system.

US woes

First on the agenda will be a need to improve execution, with a particular focus in North America where RIM has hemorrhaged market share after a year marked by product delays and a botched launch of its PlayBook tablet.

"It takes nine months for a product to get to market once you have thought about what you want to do," Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi told Reuters. "They are looking at least a year from a transitional perspective.

"Picking Thorsten is a sign that they haven't quite decided that (a sale is what) they want to do, so they might give it yet another shot at looking at the business and trying to come back."

As the window for a turnaround closes, the clamor from shareholders for the company to license its technology to third parties or even sell the business has got louder.

"RIM's Achilles heel is its hardware focus," said Victor Basta, managing director at Magister Advisors.

"IBM is a very rare exception to the rule, but it took them a decade to transition from a hardware to a software focus. RIM does not have the luxury of a decade."

Investors have seized on any rumor of a deal, whether with Amazon as reported by Reuters in December or with Samsung last week, as reason to celebrate.

Nokia in the frame

Analysts have said that logical buyers for RIM also include fellow-struggler Nokia, perhaps with support from Microsoft, and Facebook which is increasingly pushing its content to users via their mobile phones.

If there is no obvious buyer, Heins does have more immediate options to add value to the business.

Heins says his most immediate concern was to sell RIM's current lineup of BlackBerry 7 touchscreen devices, deliver on a promised software upgrade for its PlayBook tablet computer by February, and rally RIM's troops to launch the next-generation BlackBerry 10 phones later this year.

Longer term, RIM could license its software or integrate its email package, a strategy that many analysts and investors have thought the company might pursue. Heins, formerly one of RIM's chief operating officers, said it would be wrong to focus on that option but he is still open to discussions.

The two men who Heins replaces together built Lazaridis' 1985 start-up into a global business. Both men, also two of RIM's three largest shareholders with more than 5 percent each, will remain board members while Lazaridis will stay on as the head of a newly created innovation committee.

"RIM have had big challenges in the past and they succeeded in moving from a corporate product to be also a consumer product, to get a foot in the consumer market and very few people expected them to do that," consultant John Strand said.

"Now they have to reinvent themselves again." — Reuters

source:gmanetwork.com