RIM defends home turf and remains king!

[Joelcool7]

I was actually under the impression RIM was doing far worse then it appears they are. Yes they are third place but look at Microsoft's Windows phones or Symbian or any other phone for that matter, RIM is kicking the shit out of them. Also the fact that RIM is still holding on to 18% of the US market shows they are still a contender, no they aren't in a great position but they certainly aren't in as bad as I thought they were (Market share wise).

Everyone is right RIM needs to change their direction and admit a problem which I don't think they are doing. Their recent announcement of Android iOS controls (Which has me lost I didn't understand exactly what kind of compatability and control RIM is bringing to their phones) that kind of move could be ground breaking. Also the move to slowly adapt to the touch screen based phone ditching the famous keyboard shows that their phones may soon be on the exact same playing field as Apple and Android.

The problem I see is the emerging markets Apple and Android cannot take a massive market share in say Africa or India or even most of the middle east. Why? Because those area's are poverty stricken, I think RIM has a chance to dominate those markets by offering a cheap affordable BlackBerry.

I know BlackBerry's can currently be made pretty cheap and if RIM bought up say Datawind and got them working on cheap affordable smart phones for the developing world. RIM would have a secret weapon. Android and Apple couldn't possibly create touch screen centric smart phones to compete against cheap BlackBerry's in the developing world.

I think RIM's stubborness to remain a high end business phone company is whats hurting them. It used to be that those who owned smart phones were business people and they had both money to throw around and wanted the highest quality business phone. But today the average smart phone owner is not a CEO or executive its a spoiled rotten teenager or middle class young adult. RIM is not adapting to the market they are fighting the war the way they fought it in the old market, they need to adapt and they are failing to do so.