RIM to Take Shotgun Approach With a Half-Dozen BB10 Handsets
Speaking with Fierce Wireless, RIM CMO Frank Boulben said the company will debut at least six BB10 handsets in 2013, each one aimed at a different market segment. Some 150 carriers are currently testing BB10, and RIM has wisely chosen not to sign exclusivity relationships with any of them.
That should give it a fighting chance in the highly competitive market it has ceded to Google and Apple over the past few years. No exclusivity deals means fewer restrictions on what devices can be sold, and by whom. That leaves RIM free to hit the smartphone market at various levels on various carriers.
Add to that the 70,000 or so applications that RIM promises will be available for BB10 at launch, and it starts to look like the OS really does have a shot at evolving into the third-place contender RIM believes it to be. It’s certainly not implausible. Remember, RIM has an installed base of about 79 million existing BlackBerry users.