Exactly which direction BlackBerry will pursue in the near future remains unclear. However, the signs suggest that it plans to focus even more heavily on mobile device management (MDM).
In his first major statement since taking over from Thorsten Heins, who resigned earlier this month after plans to take the company private fell through, CEO John Chen said this about Blackberry’s future technology direction:
We have begun moving the company to embrace a multi-platform, BYOD world by adopting a new mobility management platform and a new device strategy. We are also leveraging our tremendous assets, including BBM, our network and QNX. While we are proud of these accomplishments, we know there is more work to be done.
Listing mobile management first ties in with the broad suggestion throughout this year that BlackBerry wants to concentrate enterprise customers, historically its strongest area. The challenge there is that in the bring-your-own-device (BYOD) era, merely selling devices to businesses is tricky. Focusing on MDM could make sense, but that’s also a highly competitive field.
BlackBerry is also remaining active in other fields. Yesterday it launched a presentation editor for BlackBerry phones, and its ports of BlackBerry Messenger to Android and iOS have been relatively successful after its initial botched launch.
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