BLACKBERRY - The future belongs to software

After ruling over most of the smartphone market just some years back BlackBerry now sources its earnings mostly from its business clients that use its services for security and handling of wireless devices and applications.

As sales of its smartphones declined, nearly 50% of the company's earnings, in its most recent quarter, came from its Services division.

BlackBerry caters to these businesses through its BlackBerry Enterprise Server 10 hardware that companies install and maintain.

However, hardware of any sort may be an untenable solution for the company to move ahead.

And so at Blackberry, the future if the company has got any luck, is going to be in software for the enterprise. 

Posted by www.anymobilesmartphone.co.uk
www.anymobilesmartphone.com

Google hires staff, Blackberry sheds staff.

The Google owned company Motorola is creating jobs while the other Smartphone company Blackberry goes under.

Here's a light amid the doom and gloom. There's a smartphone maker in town that's hiring even as BlackBerry sheds jobs.

Motorola just opened a 10-person office in Kitchener and is looking to expand. The Google-owned firm with an established brand makes smartphones and tablets.

With news this week that BlackBerry is cutting 4,500 jobs, many have heard this region has other technology jobs to be filled. This is a real example.

"We'll hire as many people as we can that we think are the best and brightest," said Derek Phillips, engineering director for Motorola Canada. "We will grow as fast as we can find the best people."

Motorola sells more smartphones in the U.S. than BlackBerry. The firm is looking for people keen to develop good software to show off its best hardware. More plainly, people with computer skills who can help make Motorola devices even friendlier and easier to use.

Examples on its latest device include a feature that lets you talk more easily to your phone, and a feature that lets you activate the camera by twisting the phone twice, rather than pressing the power button and hunting for the icon.

"What we're interested in are things that make it easier to interact with your phone," Phillips said.

Motorola is settling in this region because it's confident in the talent, said Phillips, a University of Waterloo graduate. Its office is in the renovated Breithaupt Block building in central Kitchener. "This has been in discussion for months," he said.

He would not say how many Motorola jobs are available but said the firm is looking for recent graduates as well as more experienced people. He can be reached at phillips@motorola.com

"I am very positive about the region," he said. "Our intent is to put the word out and say, we're interested in hiring the best people, make ourselves available, provide an opportunity which would be very exciting."

Posted by www.anymobilesmartphone.co.uk

Blackberry Messenger Susspended & Paused

If your thinking about downloading BBM from the Apple app store well think again, this has been pulled, and stopped, even the Andriod app though the software teams at BlackBerry suggested they’d be beginning the roll-out of BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) as an app for Android and iOS starting this week, it would now appear that they’ve hit the proverbial pause button for both platforms. While it’s unclear at the moment if this cut in downloads and service to the chat app ecosystem for both Google and Apple’s mobile OS had anything to do with BlackBerry’s announcement of history-making losses for the quarter, it is clear that the results are thus: some people can use BBM today, others cannot.

Straight from Inside BlackBerry’s Luke Reimer comes word that some issues have arisen for both the Android and iOS versions of BBM. First, it would seem that the BBM app for Android was never officially released, but the BBM team saw a whopping 1.1 million active users in the first 8 hours of app release.

The BBM user numbers BlackBerry speaks of here come from an unofficial “unreleased version of the BBM for Android app” which was posted online before it could hit Google Play. BlackBerry is being iffy on how this app saw the light of day, but are now addressing “issues” that appeared when this so-called “unreleased” version began to spread. Unlucky you, Android users: BlackBerry has begun disabling this first app – no matter how legitimate it may seem – and the real version’s release date is again in flux.

And the iOS version of BBM? There’ve been some oddities in that release as well. Though some users in places like the iTunes app store for New Zealand were able to download the real-deal iOS version of BBM for iPhone, downloads have been stopped worldwide. The good news for iOS users that did access this app early is that they’ll be able to continue using it (for the time being).

"As soon as we are able, we will begin a staggered country roll-out of BBM for Android and continue the roll-out of BBM for iPhone. … These issues have not impacted BBM service for BlackBerry.” – Luke Reimer, BlackBerry

No worries if you’re working with a real BlackBerry smartphone and have BBM kicking out the messages like normal – service will continue as planned. The “global roll-out of BBM for Android and iPhone”, on the other hand, is hereby paused.

Posted by www.anymobilesmartphone.co.uk