BlackBerry finally took down its “for sale” sign last month after endless speculation about its future. The company didn’t go private as many expected it to, rather it took a $1 billion institutional investment and shuffled top management. Now, all eyes are on BlackBerry’s performance in the coming quarters. While new CEO John S. Chen says that the company is returning to its roots of enterprise management and devices, a new report from Digitimes suggests that BlackBerry is likely to replace its ailing core hardware business with software services.
Its no surprise that BlackBerry’s hardware division has burnt through a lot of cash, cash that the company desperately needs. All of the devices released in 2013 failed to generate enough revenue for the company, which had to take a $1 billion hit due to unsold Z10 inventory. Citing “industry watchers,” the report claims that the hardware business might be replaced with software service because of the increasing popularity of BBM on iOS and Android. In its first week alone, the service added 20 million new BBM users from the rival platforms. Moreover, BlackBerry recently partnered up with various Android OEMs to have BBM pre-installed on their devices. The company also said that its going to focus more on enterprise solutions from now on, and while Chen has already said that currently there are no plans to shut down the hardware business, who knows what 2014 will bring.
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