BlackBerry’s ship has been in troubled waters for the past few years now, and the waters don’t appear to be calming down any time soon. One of the company’s divisions that’s not bleeding money like devices and hardware is BlackBerry Messenger, which has actually experience some growth after it was opened up to Android and iOS last year. The company continues to add more features across all platforms and has also committed to launching BBM for Windows Phone this summer. It also has plans to branch into mobile payments, at least that’s what BlackBerry enterprise unit president John Sims tells Re/code.
In mature markets, companies are looking towards NFC, fingerprint sensors and other futuristic technologies for payments. These technologies don’t have that approach in emerging markets, where BlackBerry and BBM in particular enjoy some dominance. Sims says that BlackBerry is currently meeting with partners in those markets and exploring their options, “money movement is an important thing,” he says. This won’t be the company’s first foray into this market, last year it tested the BBM Money service in Indonesia in collaboration with Bank Permata, a local Indonesian bank. Its unclear if this service ever makes it to mature markets, but it should serve the company’s interests in those markets.
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