Apple scored a major corporate client today in Ford, the second largest U.S. automaker.
Ford has announced that it is switching from Blackerry to the iPhone, and new iPhones will be in the hands of thousands of employees by the end of 2014.
Although BlackBerry hasn’t been a serious competitor to the iPhone in years, the UK phone trade-in website “Cash for phones comparison” has published some pretty damning statistics, showing just how massive the gulf is between the two “competitors.”
Only 8 percent of customers who traded in an old BlackBerry phone claimed any kind of loyalty to the brand, while an overwhelming majority of 66 percent decided to switch to an iPhone. However, it seems that these people weren’t looking so much to get a new iPhone as they were to get any iPhone — since 42.1 percent of respondees decided to ditch their trustworthy BlackBerry for an iPhone 4: a phone which was introduced all the way back in 2010.
The smartphone wars are two company race and it’s not even close.
Apple and Samsung are dominating the competition so badly that a new report from Canaccord Genuity claims the two tech giants account for 106% of global smartphone profits.
Take a look at this chart:
BlackBerry has announced that it will not renew the T-Mobile (U.S.) license to sell its products when it expires on April 25 — ending a decade-plus relationship between the two companies.
“BlackBerry has had a positive relationship with T-Mobile for many years. Regretfully, at this time, our strategies are not complementary and we must act in the best interest of our BlackBerry customers,” said BlackBerry CEO John Chen in a statement.
BlackBerry — the beleaguered Canadian smartphone maker that controls literally 0 percent U.S. market share — is now suing its own executives to prevent them from quitting their jobs and flocking to Apple. Really!
We’ll admit we’ve called the iPhone 5c a flop more than a few times. But it’s important to remember that what is a flop for Apple would be a huge success by the standards of any other company, which is why the iPhone 5c outsold every Blackberry, Windows Phone and Android flagship in Q4.
That’s not to say that the iPhone 5c’s sales are what Apple wants it to be. In the most recent quarterly earnings conference call, Tim Cook himself admitted that iPhone 5c demand “turned out to be different than we thought.” Even though the iPhone 5c is selling well according to the standards of the rest of the smartphone industry, you have to wonder if even for $100 less, people would really prever a colorful plastic iPhone 5c than a premium-feeling iPhone 5. Even people opting for year old miles are buying an iPhone to get a high-end product, and the major failing of the iPhone 5c seems to be the plastic just doesn’t satisfy that requirement. What do you think?
iPhone users may be “wall huggers” according to BlackBerry CEO John Chen, but that doesn’t mean that he’s not taking a page or two out of the Apple playbook.
Describing his vision for BlackBerry in a recent interview with the New York Times, Chen compared his present situation to that of Steve Jobs returning to a beleaguered Apple in the late-1990s.
Takes one to know one, Blackberry. The CEO of the beleaguered Canadian smartphone manufacturer — which recently celebrated achieving its first 0% market share since the smartphone wars started — is now calling iPhone owners “wall huggers.”
Apple designed CarPlay “from the ground up” to be the future of car dashboard systems. And while technology is still based on iOS, how it communicates with the car is another matter. CarPlay utilizes QNX, the leading platform in the growing “infotainment system industry” that is owned by none other than Blackberry.
Apple is listed as a partner on the QNX website. QNX runs the embedded systems in many vehicles, including luxury brands Apple has associated CarPlay with, like Mercedes.
Blackberry has been dealt another blow as yet another major customer jumps ship to iPhone. The U.S. Air Force is planning on replacing 5,000 Blackberries with iPhones.
When T-Mobile sent out an email to BlackBerry-using customers suggesting that they switch to an iPhone 5s, the response from the BB faithful was loud and angry.
Even BlackBerry CEO John Chen said that he was “outraged” by T-Mobile’s behavior.
As a make-good, the network operator has now said that it will offer any customer who wants to upgrade to a new device $250 for a BlackBerry phone — or $200 for any other smartphone, including the iPhone.
Do you think Blackberry is dead? So does T-Mobile, which is why they tried to get Blackberry customers on the network to switch over to Apple’s smartphone. But apparently, Blackberry has some life in it yet… or enough, at least, to get pissed off about T-Mobile counting the Canadian smartphone maker out.
BlackBerry and Windows Phone might be having a hard time trying to break up the monopoly on mobile software held by Android and iOS, but that hasn’t stopped the Chinese government from having a go with a platform of its own.
Built by a company called Shanghai Liantong in conjunction with ISCAS (Institute of Software at the Chinese Academy of Sciences), COS — which stands for China Operating System — aims to take on Android and iOS by providing better localization for things like language input and cloud services.
While Microsoft and BlackBerry are still trying to piece together a decent mobile user base in the U.S., Apple and Samsung managed to widen their lead against the competition in terms of smartphone marketshare in the U.S. Both companies experienced a significant bump in 2013, but Apple claimed the largest increase despite murmurs that the company is getting out innovated by Google.
Last month, we told you about a new startup called Typo Keyboard that’s backed and co-founded by TV/radio personality Ryan Seacrest. The story behind it was that Seacrest was so frustrated with the iPhone’s lack of a physical keyboard that he decided to personally invest $1 million in a solution.
We called the Typo keyboard accessory “BlackBerry-inspired” at the time, which was a mild way of saying that it looks like a complete ripoff of Blackberry’s layout. Blackberry isn’t happy, and the company has now sued Seacrest’s startup.
Which phone users are the smartest?
According to a peer-reviewed scientific study online intelligence test by renowned university British betting company Ladbrokes, the answer is iPhone owners.
BBM has been a huge success on Android and iOS, and so although they may be rival platforms, that won’t stop BlackBerry from porting over its biggest and best BBM features to keep its messaging service alive.
In 2014, the Canadian company will rollout major updates that add BBM Channels, BBM Voice, and new sharing features — and you can see them in action in the video below.
No matter how you feel about Apple and the iPhone, it’s impossible to deny that the device completely revolutionized the mobile industry when it was launched in 2007. Without it, the smartphones of today may have been completely different.
Take Android, for example. It’s the biggest competitor to the iOS operating system that powers the iPhone, and it’s now the world’s largest mobile platform — but the iPhone is the reason Android is what it is today. Google started work on the software way back in 2005, but it scrapped everything and started again the day after iPhone was revealed to the world.
When Barack Obama first made his run at the United States presidency way back in 2008, much fuss was made about how this politician was so cool, he used a BlackBerry.
Seems laughable now, doesn’t it? Yet at the time, Obama was considered so technologically hip for using a BlackBerry that he once laughingly said that if the Secret Service wanted to take it from him, they’d have to pry it from his hands.
Flash forward five years, and President Obama’s BlackBerry doesn’t seem so cool anymore. In fact, it seems ridiculous. So why isn’t he using an iPhone?
BBM Channels, the latest addition to BlackBerry’s popular messaging platform, which made its public debut earlier today after more than six months in beta, is coming to Android and iOS “in the coming months.”
Former Apple CEO John Sculley has confirmed that he and a group of investors were lining up a bid for BlackBerry, but they waited too long and lost out. In an interview on Bloomberg Surveillance, Sculley reveals how he was surprised when the struggling smartphone maker announced a $1 billion investment deal earlier this week.
Apple is reportedly teaming up with new suppliers to boost production of the iPhone 5c and the iPad mini to meet strong consumer demand, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Wistron Corp., a manufacturer based in Taiwan that already produces smartphones for BlackBerry and Nokia, will be tasked with assembling the iPhone 5c; while Compal Communications, which currently works with Acer, Dell, Lenovo, and others, will manufacturer the iPad mini.
Music streaming service Deezer has today announced that it now has more than 5 million paid subscribers worldwide, and it’s launching a new native Mac app that will improve the Deezer experience on your desktop. The app will sync with your existing iTunes library, and it will allow you to store music locally for offline access.
BlackBerry has today announced that it has scrapped plans to sell its hardware business, and that it will be replacing current CEO Thorsten Heins instead. The Canadian company has also secured $1 billion from a group of investors led by Fairfax Financial, and its CEO, Prem Watsa, will become lead director.
Worldwide smartphones shipments reached a whopping 251.4 million units during the third quarter of 2013, up 45% from the 172.8 million units sold during the same quarter last year, and 81.3% of them were running Android. The iPhone’s share fell to 13.4%, while Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform reached 4.1% — an improvement over last year’s 2.1% share.
