BlackBerry Receives Takeover Bid Worth $4.7 Billion or $9/Share

[Robster3]

I have had a bold 900, 9700 and Torch. Actually like the Z10 too. Have a 5S. 3 things i liked, email, notification light and always had great reception.
Syncing with a mac was hopeless thats what sent me to iPhone 4S.

 

[wilsonlaidlaw]

OMG - what was second prize?

I can only assume that Fairfax intend to be come patent trolls, as this is the only way I can see this purchase being monetized. This must rank with Microsoft's purchase of Nokia as one of the worst examples of spare cash burning a hole in the board's pocket and having to be spent on something, no matter how nonsensical.

 

[HyperZboy]

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), previously known as the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) which will run OBAMACARE are required to use BlackBerrys for all governmental communication. I was told this by a government department head while he fumbled on his BlackBerry to try to get me a score during an NFL game. I said, "How do you not have the score yet?" And he said, "They make us use these but they hang sometimes, are slow, and insecure. They're thinking about switching to iPhones but the decision hasn't come down yet. We have done studies and know the iPhone is more secure, but for now I'm stuck with this."

I rest my case. Put a fork in it.

What will happen is they will gradually sell the patents off one by one just like Obama is exempting off company by company from Obamacare.

The 2 business plans are a perfect match! LOL

 

[LordVic]

I've had Curves, Torches a Bold and even the Z10.

its a shame that they couldn't deliver quality in time. BB10 was actually a really excellent OS. Unfortunately. They over promised, Under delivered, and delayed, Delayed, Delayed till it was irrelevant. Nobody was going to buy their new platform when they were told for nearly 2 years "Soon™". They left and went elsewhere.

I loved the Z10. it was a pleasure to use. The OS itself was smoother, and a lot more intuitive than Android.

Unfortunately, having a great feeling platform is irrelevant if you can't do dwhat you need to do on it. after 2 months, I found there was less functionality and Apps' available for BB10 than the old BBOS7 platform. having lost functionality and app support, I said screw it and went Android.

But I always figured I'd go back to Blackberry in 2-3 years time. give them time to grow and mature the OS and make BB10 more robust. but they've kept dropping the ball over and over and over again.

Now, if Apple would just offer a 4.7-5" iPhone, I would make a serious thought of switching.

 

[peterdevries]

Thorsten Heins was a joke of a CEO, without the right attitude to get the company going in the right direction ... the worst thing the company could've done at a time when they were already in serious trouble.

Heins is a typical lemon squeezer type of CEO. Focused on cost cutting and performance improvement. What he lacks is a strategic view on what Blackberry needs in the current environment. The strategy that he chose was one that would buy the organisation little time in an environment that now requires radical change to be effective. it wasn't enough.

What BB needs is a CEO with a vision and the power to see it through. The vision should go beyond protecting the limited market share that BB is clinging too, but should be aimed at developing new revolutionary products or services. That is the only way BB can get back in position. This is however an almost impossible task with the current maturity of the market.

The best thing to do is focus on new big bets. The difficulty in this is identifying the big bets of the future and then excelling in exploiting those. My personal opinion is that BB does not have the chops for that and that it will follow Palm's path.

 

[akm3]

actually the other way round.
BlackBerry is already the much better OS than Android (webgl out of the box, flash support, better battery life, gesture controlled not '3 types of stupid buttons' based - I've a HTC One and love it but against the Z10 its a joke productivity and performance wise for what it packs hw wise), BlackBerrys problem is the hillarious price for the specs they offer. The Z10 is basically a Galaxy S3 but was launched in GS4 days at GS4 prices which is not only hillarious but totally arrogant and ignorant towards the market.

Gaming performance wise though the Z10 can easily beat the GS3 for example because BlackBerry actually cares about support and optimization (they are slow but their drivers are not remotely as crappy as those of Samsung and HTC which totally crush what the respective hardware in the flag ship devices could do)

I would hate to see BB10 going away as it is, aside of WP8, the only mobile OS that really gives a crap about productive business use.

Android requires two dozen hacks and custom overrides to get there and iOS simply force-prevents anyone from getting the related features.
BlackBerry HUB for example is a concept that is not remotely matched by anyone (WP8 communication hub is the thing closest to it)


I at the time put my hope into Sailfish OS from jolla to be what BB10 could have been productivity and gesture control wise, that it spreads, as I don't see Tizen to fill this spot, its too poised by Android and iOS approaches to be of use.

I know BB10 is better than android, but that's not the point. They lost, it's dead dead dead.

 

[k995]

I guess that is a solution. But kind of too bad that they can't make a flagship phone that isn't large and heavy. Aren't those phones underpowered? I guess it all depends on how well the OS runs on the hardware.

No I used the Omnia 7 for a while, single CPU WM 7.8 with certain WM 8 Parts in it. Worked very nicely. It actuall ran the best of all the "old" devices I had.

Of course WM lacks certain features others have so its difficult to compare.

 

[i4m]

There is a certain sadness when you witness a once mighty technology company slowly crumbling away.

not really, they had the market, they just got very comfortable... the iPhone (and what followed) became its doom.

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End of an era. They'll just break it up and sell off the component parts to the highest bidder.

Not going to shed a tear for them... somewhere down the line, they gave up on their customers.

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One day Apple will be irrelevant also. I just hope it happens long after I'm unable to care.

Stop freaking us out

 

[quickmac]

What on earth does advertising have to do with a device's capabilities? Ignore the advertising; it's almost all hyperbole anyway. The iPhone's business features grow all the time. It can more than do the job for the vast majority of professionals out there, which is why more and more businesses are approving iPhones.

Because the general public tends to "just buy whatever is popular" or "looks cool." So yes marketing and advertising is a huge component of selling phones. You think Apple is making millions off businesses? No they make their millions off the average joe schmoe who just buys the iPhone because "it must be good for me if everyone has it." You'd be surprised how uninformed and even uninterested the general public is in differences in devices and which one might be best. Most people default to iPhone because "well it's the best." But is it really? Advertising increases sales in most cases if done right.