BlackBerry maker Research in Motion has lost a lot of ground in the smartphone market, but at the company's annual conference for application developers on Tuesday in San Jose, California, it was clear that one of its most important constituencies is sticking by the company, at least for now.
Once a leading player in the smartphone business, RIM's BlackBerry has fallen behind Apple's iPhone and phones running on Google's Android platform. Those devices surged in popularity among consumers drawn to their touch screens and quickly growing app stores. RIM made a few seemingly half-hearted efforts to keep up by releasing touch-screen BlackBerrys and, last year, a tablet called the PlayBook. But it only fell behind. According to IDC, BlackBerrys comprised 4.8 percent of global smartphone shipments in the second quarter, compared with 11.5 percent a year earlier. Android smartphones and the iPhone made up 85 percent of the market.
Now Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM hopes its long-delayed next-generation operating software, BlackBerry 10, will reëstablish the company. BlackBerry 10 is scheduled to come out early next year—missing the always-important holiday shopping season, but perhaps giving the company plenty of time to get it right.
Story continues below--View the Original article
No comments:
Post a Comment