[ 2011-04-13 ]

The new device goes on sale in the United States this month

BlackBerry maker turns its fire on Apple’s iPad
The Playbook tablet computer will be the saviour
of Research In Motion, according to the co-chief
executive of the maker of the BlackBerry.
Analysts have claimed that the company is on the
verge of decline after being outflanked in the
smartphone market by Apple’s iPhone and devices
based on Google’s Android operating system.
But Mike Lazaridis has told The Times that he
cannot understand the growing criticism that RIM
had faced in recent weeks. With Playbook, it
believes that it can take on Apple and Google in
the battle over touchscreen tablet computers.
The new device goes on sale in the United States
this month and other markets shortly after that.
It is significantly smaller and lighter than
Apple’s iPad, but joins a crowded market with
about 80 tablets due to be released this year,
with a number of the gadgets running on Android.
RIM is under pressure after losing more than 11
per cent of its value in one day of trading in the
wake of its latest earnings announcement in March
and has suffered heavy criticism by industry
analysts.
The company said that it had shipped 700,000 more
phones than in the previous quarter and that net
income was up 32 per cent to $934 million (£571
million). Yet analysts were concerned by the
figures, saying that BlackBerry sales were
sluggish compared with rival devices such as the
iPhone and Android mobiles. One — Jean-Louis
Gassée, a partner at Allegis Capital — went so
far as to say that “the inmates had taken over
the asylum” at RIM. He argued that it had made a
number of strategic errors and that the
company’s technology was well behind that of
Apple and Google.
Mr Lazaridis said that he could not fathom what
had sparked the backlash. “I could be comical
and say it’s because we’re Canadian,” he
quipped. “It’s hard for people to understand
our foundations. I can’t understand why we’re
getting these stories all the time. I’m
concentrating on bringing out new products and
going global.”
Many industry insiders have their doubts about the
potential success of Playbook, as well as RIM’s
smartphone business. It was notable that when
Stephen Elop, the chief executive of Nokia,
announced its deal to use Microsoft’s Windows
phone system on its mobiles earlier this year, he
talked of turning the battle for supremacy over
smartphones into a “three-horse race” —
between Apple, Google and the Nokia-Microsoft
pairing.
Despite RIM’s BlackBerry having a healthy share
of the smartphone market, many do not believe that
it will be a genuine competitor in the future.
Some analysts argue that the company should have
adopted Android rather than developing its own
operating system, QNX. However, the Playbook can
access Android’s marketplace, enabling users to
tap the thousands of apps in Google’s system.
“People don’t understand why we took a
different route than Android, but QNX is so much
more powerful,” Mr Lazaridis said.
He also addressed criticism that the Playbook did
not have 3G net access, arguing that most users
were satisfied with wi-fi. “You’ll see no
difference in performance and you’re saving
money [on monthly contracts],” he said. “All
these products out coming this year — why do you
need all these redundant features?”

Source - The Times(UK)

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