RIM gives it the old junior college try, aims for third place

RIM is taking a beating on the modern smartphone market and continues to be unable to muster a device to offer any significant competition to Android or the iPhone. The company has fallen from grace massively from the days when it was the most popular smartphone on the market. RIM CEO Thorsten Heins said this week that in the company's decision to bet it all on the BlackBerry 10 OS would allow the company to grow its user base in the US and North America.

The US and North American markets are where RIM has experienced much of its customer loss. RIM seems to know that at least for now it doesn't really have a chance of the dethroning the iPhone or Android and is content to aim for third place in the market. I expect Windows Phone 8 has a better chance at taking third-place spot than RIM.

RIM will have to beat Symbian, which sits in the third-place spot currently in the OS ecosystem. According to Heins, developers are eager to build apps for BlackBerry users. Heins didn't offer any of the information that many people wanted to know about BlackBerry 10 such as when the new devices would be available.

As close as he came to offering details on availability was reiterating that the devices would be coming in Q1 2013. So far, there is no indication on what sort of pricing RIM will demand for BlackBerry 10 devices and what carriers have agreed to offer the smartphones. One key fact that remains unexplained is what exactly will set BlackBerry 10 apart from competing products on the market and make consumers want to purchase BlackBerry smartphones again. Earlier this week, RIM confirmed carrier testing for the BlackBerry 10 operating system would begin next month.

"BlackBerry 10 is on track," Heins said. "Our sales forces are getting ready. Better devices are in testing."

[via CNET]