It seems like every time Research in Motion takes half a step forward something comes along to knock them a full step back.  In this week’s edition of What Else Can Go Wrong for RIM, energy services company Halliburton has announced plans to drop support for BlackBerry in favor of the iPhone.

“We are making this transition in order to better support our mobile applications initiatives,” said Beverly Blohm Stafford, director of corporate affairs for Halliburton, in a statement. “Halliburton has engaged with Apple on this transition.”

Of Halliburton’s 70,000 global workers, 4500 of them have been issued BlackBerry devices which will be swapped out for iPhones over the next two years.  Companies, in increasing numbers, are allowing employees to connect their personal iPhones to corporate email systems.  If Halliburton follows suit, the number of iPhone users they support could number in the tens of thousands.

[Via New York Times]

Halliburton Drops BlackBerry for the iPhone is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

Research in Motion has announced BlackBerry Innovation Forum 2012 dates for both the United States and Canada. Started back in 2011, the BlackBerry Innovation Forums are intended for anyone who manages, develops, or architects BlackBerry devices or BlackBerry Enterprise Server in the workplace.

Head over to the BlackBerry Innovation Forum website for a complete list of dates in the United States and Canada…

BlackBerry Innovation Forum 2012 Dates have been announced is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

In a recent CrackBerry.com interview Research in Motion CEO, Thorsten Heins, had this to say when asked if we would ever see BlackBerry Messenger on other platforms…

You should never rule this out; business is very very dynamic. It’s dynamic on the device side as well as on the software side. So never say no to anything. We’re constantly exploring our room to maneuver and our room to explore other businesses so I wouldn’t say categorically no to it. There is a time where this might make sense, and I have a team looking into this. I’m not saying I won’t license. People are again putting this in a black and white spot. I’m open for licensing if it makes sense. But it’s not what I was hired for; I was not hired to build a licensing company. I was hired to take BlackBerry to new heights. And that’s what I will do with my team.

Mr. Heins isn’t necessarily saying that RIM is planning to take  BBM cross platform, however, he seems a lot more open to the idea than management at RIM did just 7 months ago.

Would do you think?  Would a cross platform BlackBerry Messenger be a good thing for RIM?

[Via CrackBerry]

Thorsten Heins Says Cross Platform BBM Not Ruled Out is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

According to a  report in the Financial Times, Research in Motion’s board is preparing to oust co-chairs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie due to intense pressure from shareholders who watched RIM’s stock price drop over 75% in 2011.  Independent director Barbara Stymiest is rumored to be the front runner to replace Lazaridis and Balsillie who will remain co-CEOs of the company.

Research in Motion board looking to replace Lazaridis and Balsillie with new Chairman of the Board: Sources say is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

When it comes to smartphone platform market share in the United States, the story is starting to become more or less the same ole thing month after month…  Android gains a lot, Apple gains a little, RIM loses a lot, and everyone else loses a little.

For the three month period ending in Nov. 2011 Research in Motion lost 3.1% market share down to 16.6%.  Android gained exactly what RIM lost, 3.1% up to 46.9% total share.  Apple gained 1.4% up to 28.7%, and, Microsoft and Symbian lost 0.5% and 0.3% respectively.

As we move into 2012 a big question for me me is what, if anything , can RIM do to turn things around.

ComScore: RIM’s loss is Android’s gain… is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

Earlier this month when a federal court in Albuquerque, New Mexico barred Research in Motion from using the trademarked name BBX RIM simply changed the name of their next-generation, QNX based, BlackBerry operating system to BlackBerry 10 suffering little more than the embarrassment of not having acquired the right to use the trademark before actually using it.

RIM finds itself in another legal battle over the use of  BBM, short for RIM’s 50 million user plus BlackBerry Messenger mobile IM service, with BBM Canada, an industry group of broadcasters, advertisers and ad agencies, that has been using BBM in their branding for nearly 70 years.

BlackBerry Messenger users have been informally referring BlackBerry Messenger as BBM for years, and, after RIM started officially using the acronym, has become a core piece of RIM’s brand, and is a linchpin of the company’s global expansion, so it is doubtful that RIM will just stop using BBM.

The big problem for RIM is that the company was informed that BBM “was not registerable” when they applied for a trademark back in 2010.  Furthermore, Jim MacLeod, president of BBM Canada contacted RIM agreeing rebrand BBM Canada if RIM paid the costs of doing so.

After making no progress with RIM,  BBM Canada filed a lawsuit alleging trademark infringement, on Aug. 12, 2010  and is seeking an injunction stopping RIM and its employees from using the term BBM, as well as damages for infringement and punitive damages.

Having become a bit of a PR nightmare for RIM, the company has released this statement…

“Since its launch in July 2005, BlackBerry Messenger has become a tremendously popular social networking service. In 2010, RIM started to formally adopt the BBM acronym, which had, at that point, already been organically coined and widely used by BlackBerry Messenger customers as a natural abbreviation of the BlackBerry Messenger name.  The services associated with RIM’s BBM offering clearly do not overlap with BBM Canada’s services and the two marks are therefore eligible to co-exist under Canadian trademark law. The two companies are in different industries and have never been competitors in any area. We believe that BBM Canada is attempting to obtain trademark protection for the BBM acronym that is well beyond the narrow range of the services it provides and well beyond the scope of rights afforded by Canadian trademark law. RIM has therefore asked the Court to dismiss the application and award costs to RIM. Further, for clarity, RIM’s application to register BBM as a trademark with the Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) is pending and we are confident that a registration will eventually issue. The inference by BBM Canada that CIPO has refused RIM’s BBM trademark application is quite frankly very misleading.”

Reseach in Motion and BBM Canada meet in court on Jan. 11th.

RIM faces legal battle over use of the trademarked acronym BBM is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

Word on the street is that Amazon was interested in buying Research in Motion last summer and even hired an investment bank to review a potential merger, but, never got to the point of making a formal offer because RIM’s management did not want to sell or break up the company.

(Reuters) – Research In Motion Ltd has turned down takeover overtures from Amazon.com Inc and other potential buyers because the BlackBerry maker prefers to fix its problems on its own, according to people with knowledge of the situation.

The good news is that Amazon and RIM are still discussing ways to expand their commercial ties.  Research in Motion really has no media ecosystem to speak of.  Amazon has one of the largest.

Amazon sells a tablet that competes with the BlackBerry PlayBook, but, the Kindle Fire, at this point, seems to be a play to bring consumers into Amazon’s ecosystem.  The BlackBerry PlayBook needs content and Amazon wouldn’t mind more consumers playing in their ecosystem.

[Via Reuters]

Amazon looked into buying RIM last summer, but, RIM wasn’t interested… is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

On the eve of Research in Motion’s Third Quarter Fiscal 2012 earnings call, shares in the company dropped to their lowest level since May of 2004, down 2.5% closing at $15.08.

Back at the beginning of the month RIM adjusted guidance warning that it would be at the low mid-point of what it had previously forecast and that it would record a $485 pre-tax provision for BlackBerry PlayBook inventory which the company had to deeply discount to move.

RIM’s earnings call later today should prove to be an interesting one…  What do you think will happen with RIM’s stock price (RIMM)?

RIM shares hit new 7 year low ahead of earnings call is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...

Back in October at BlackBerry DevCon 2011, Research in Motion announced that they were going to brand their new QNX based next-generation operating system with the name BBX.  Unfortunately, however, RIM didn’t check to see that BBx was already trademarked.

BASIS Software, owner of the BBx trademark, filed for and received a temporary restraining order issued by a federal court in Albuquerque barring Research in Motion from using BBX in the United States.  This is prompted RIM to rename their QNX based operating system to BlackBerry 10.

[Source]

RIM learns the hard way that they should check for existing trademarks before branding new operating systems… is a post from: RIMarkable, the Unofficial BlackBerry Weblog...