Like a boyfriend who was caught smooching some floozy, Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) is back asking for a second chance. It’s all spruced up, hair cut short and asking the market to take it seriously. It’s changed and it’s ready to commit. Now, the company says, you just need to give it a chance to prove itself all over again.
Or at least, that’s how I take it. In an article recently, Chief Marketing Officer Frank Boulben says that the company is ready to re-enter the market and grow. It just needs that second chance that so many things depend upon. Boulben has reasonably set the company’s sights on becoming the third most popular maker of smartphones in the world. I like that part, because no one’s going to knock off Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (KRX:005935) and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) anytime soon.
Still, it fell apart. Smartphones went in a different direction and devices using Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG)’s Android system and Apple’s iPhone ended up dominating the market. The new BlackBerry Z10 is ready to go and the first ones could be in user’s hands by the end of the week. Judging by what I’ve read it’s a good platform to work on. That doesn’t mean it’ll be an easy task to gain market share, though.
Still, BlackBerry is exceedingly investment-worthy, if not for the most conservative investor. Competing with a quality innovator like Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) is challenging. However, BlackBerry has the advantage of being only focused on one aspect of the market while at times Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) seems to have trouble focusing on one thing at a time. That may give BlackBerry a chance to make some moves.
Ditto, Apple. While Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is a monster of a company for Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) to challenge, the company’s focus on consumer electronics – read that: people who want to play – instead of the traditional business user makes it a bit vulnerable to a business-oriented approach. Not that a move like that will truly challenge the iPhone, but it might move some units away from the platform-of-cool that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has become.
No, the real competition here is for the business user. Those busy multi-taskers that one sees on the subway obsessively checking their devices and twitching nervously when the red light starts blinking. There’s a reason people used to call them ‘Crackberries,’ after all. The use of the older BlackBerry became a matter of compulsion for many business users. That’s the sort of devotion the firm needs to re-establish.
Which brings us to the other firm that’s going to try to target the business community. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) has a long history of gaining market dominance through leveraging the business world. Heck, anyone who has worked in an office over the last 30 years or so has worked on Windows and therefore Microsoft’s products. That, in turn, led to the establishment of Windows as the dominant operating system in home PCs as well. It’s a proven strategy for the firm.
