During Research in Motion’s annual shareholder’s meeting yesterday, RIM co-CEO Jim Balsillie said that 7 new BlackBerry devices running its next generation operating system would be out in the coming months. (For clarity, ‘next generation operating system’ actually means BlackBerry 7 which is still based on RIMs old BlackBerry OS. The real next generation QNX OS currently found running on the BlackBerry PlayBook won’t be out on the BlackBerry until early 2012.)
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Sprint has officially updated their branded version of the BlackBerry Bold 9650 to OS 6.0.0.600. If you haven’t been installing unofficial versions of BlackBerry 6 on your device, you may want to check out OS 6.0.0.600, as, it is a fairly significant bump beyond OS 6.0.0.415, Sprint’s last official update. OS 6.0.0.600, of course is a free download, and you can pick it up from the link below.
Download OS 6.0.0.600 for the Sprint BlackBerry Bold 9650
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Research in Motion has released OS breakdown information for BlackBerry users downloading applications from BlackBerry App World, and, nearly a year after the release of BlackBerry 6, almost 1 in 5 BlackBerry users, 18% to be exact, are using the latest and greatest RIM has to offer. The data also shows that 32% of BlackBerry users are still pre-BlackBerry OS 5. Usually when we think of mobile OS fragmentation, Android is the platform that jumps to mind, but, things are just as bad for the BlackBerry OS, and, they are soon going to get worse….
Uptake of BlackBerry 6 has jumped 8% in the three months since we last talked about it, but, 82% of BlackBerry users on an operating system at least one version back. This will jump to two versions back as soon as RIM releases BlackBerry 7, expected to ship sometime in the next 2 to 3 months. The real problem for RIM is that everyone who cares knows that RIM intends to replace BlackBerry 7 with QNX in ‘early 2012′.
If it took a year for RIM to get 18% adoption on BlackBerry 6, does it really make sense for developers to focus development efforts on BlackBerry 7 when they know that QNX is coming, and, coming hard?
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Google recently announced via the Google Mobile Blog that they’ve updated the Google search experience for BlackBerry 6.0 WebKit enabled devices. To make a short story shorter, Google has added a number of enhanced search features that make searching Google via the WebKit browser in BlackBerry 6 much faster.
New features include:
To use the new enhanced Google search features, just visit http://www.google.com via the WebKit browser via your BlackBerry 6 enabled device.
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I recently had a conversation with a friend who works for a company that does BlackBerry application development. One of the questions that I asked him was if his company had plans to come out with any new apps that take advantage of the new features coming in BlackBerry 7. I really wasn’t surprised by the fact that he said no, but, how emphatically he said no, and, what he said next, are not good news at all for RIM if what his company is doing is indicative of what other BlackBerry developers are doing…
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In last week’s discussion piece we asked the question “Should RIM Have Skipped BlackBerry 7 And Released New Devices Running BlackBerry 6 Sooner?“ Skipping BlackBerry 7 all together is still being debated, but, based on RIM’s Q1 Fiscal 2012 earnings call, there is no question that RIM would have been better off if they had released new hardware running BlackBerry 6 earlier in the year.
Because of delays in BlackBerry 7, RIM will miss the back-to-school shopping season meaning that the company will see their market share decline even more rapidly than it already is. RIM says the hold up in BlackBerry 7 is carrier acceptance. BlackBerry 6, however, already has carrier acceptance and RIM would have sold a heck of a lot more handsets if they had only released them running BlackBerry 6.
Unfortunately for RIM, the company is under the illusion that consumers actually care about BlackBerry 7. Most consumer BlackBerry users have never heard of BlackBerry 7 nor could they tell you what the name of the OS running on their current device is. Consumers care about apps. Consumers care about all the cool stuff their non-BlackBerry using friends are able to download and install on their devices. Consumers care about the lack of cool stuff that they can download and install on their devices.
The most popular mobile game in the world, Angry Birds, is being downloaded more than 1 million times per day, but, not by a single BlackBerry user nor will the overwhelming majority of BlackBerry users ever be able to download Angy Birds or hundreds of thousands of other applications like it. Consumers care about apps, but, unfortunately RIM thinks that smartphones are still all about BBM and email.
The more I think about it the more I believe that RIM should have taken a page out of Microsoft’s PlayBook when it comes BlackBerry operating systems beyond BlackBerry 6. When RIM decided that the future for the BlackBerry is one where devices run on QNX, the company should have put everything into getting QNX on handsets as quickly as possible and said BlackBerry 6 is it for the BlackBerry OS like MS said Windows Mobile 6.5 was it for the old Microsoft mobile OS. Because they didn’t and the fact that RIM is dealing with carrier acceptance issues, BlackBerry 7 may be a dog that won’t hunt.
Not that anyone really believes RIM when it comes to timelines the company is saying that BlackBerry handsets running QNX will be out in early 2012. This poses two huge issues for RIM seeing how they won’t even release most BlackBerry 7 devices until the Fall and Winter of 2011. A lot of folks are just going to wait it out it out and skip BlackBerry 7, and, it is going to be very difficult for RIM to convince developers to develop apps specifically for BlackBerry 7. BlackBerry 7 could potentially just extend the types of issue RIM is experiencing with BlackBerry 6.
Research in Motion has a lot of problems they need to resolve. RIM’s stock (RIMM) is tanking as I type this post and many analysts are saying that delays in BlackBerry 7 and in the touch Bold 9900/9930 could be the final nail in the coffin. I still think that RIM sells way too many devices overseas to go that far, but, RIM could could be relegated to Nokia status of few years ago here in the U.S.
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When it comes to Research in Motion’s perception of how well the BlackBerry is doing in relation to the iPhone and Android it seems like the company may be oblivious to the fact that Apple and Google are eating its lunch. The BlackBerry is losing market share in the smartphone segment hand over fist in North America and now sits in third place with no signs of being able to get back to the top of the hill in the foreseeable future. The biggest problem for RIM has been, is currently, and will continue to be the BlackBerry Operating system, which, believe it or not, is pretty much the same OS RIM has been using for the last 7 or 8 years.
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Verizon has released BlackBerry OS 6.0.0.524 for both the BlackBerry Bold 9650 and the BlackBerry Curve 3G 9330. OS 6.0.0.524 is Verizon’s first update to BlackBerry 6 since releasing in January of this year. You can pick up BlackBerry OS 5.0.0.524 from the link below, or, download it OTA to your device simply by checking for the update by heading to Options > Device > Software Updates.
Download BlackBerry OS 6.0.0.524 for the Verizon BlackBerry Bold 9650 and Curve 3G 9330
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We saw the first leak of BlackBerry 6 for the BlackBerry Bold 9700 back in November of 2010. Shortly after that, official versions of BlackBerry 6 for the BlackBerry Bold 9700 started to appear on various carriers around world, less T-Mobile, which took what seemed like an unusually long time to release an the update to their branded Bold 9700.
That being said, BlackBerry 6 is now officially available for the T-Mobile BlackBerry Bold 9700. I know for a fact that many T-Mobile users have long since updated their devices to BlackBerry 6 either with a leaked version, or, another carriers released version of BlackBerry 6, but, if you’ve been waiting to get an officially release update to BlackBerry 6 for your T-Mobile Bold 9700, your wait is over.
Download BlackBerry 6 for the T-Mobile BlackBerry Bold 9700 from T-Mobile’s BlackBerry Software Updates page…
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