So as I type this, I am watching Formula 1 qualifying from China which includes the Mercedes F1 team which is sponsored by BlackBerry. That’s ironic as I have BlackBerry news to report. Let’s start with a survey that has bad news for the smartphone maker. According to AllThingsDigital, 71% of consumers don’t want a BlackBerry:
The details: As part of its survey,* Raymond James asked respondents what features would make them more likely to buy a new iPhone or an Android or BlackBerry device: Bigger screen? Lower price? Better functionality? But it also offered them the option of saying they would never use a particular device. And plenty of respondents availed themselves of it.
Of the consumers Raymond James surveyed, 20 percent said they would never buy an iPhone, 31 percent said they’d never buy an Android phone, and 71 percent said they’d never purchase a BlackBerry.
Now, note the asterix. It’s there because of this fact: It only polled 250 consumers. So it’s not a huge sample size from a stats point of view. Still, it’s not good news if you’re trying to get consumers to buy your product.
Now there’s this news. Remember that analyst report that claimed that BlackBerry Z10s were being returned faster than they were being sold? BlackBerry wants security regulators to investigate:
The Waterloo, Ont.-based tech giant is calling on the Ontario Securities Commission and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate the report by Detwiler Fenton & Co., a Boston-based financial services firm.
BlackBerry called the report “false and misleading” and said it was issued to deliberately affect the stock price.
“These materially false and misleading comments about device return rates in the United States harm BlackBerry and our shareholders, and we call upon the appropriate authorities in Canada and the United States to conduct an immediate investigation,” BlackBerry chief legal officer Steve Zipperstein said in a release issued Friday.
“Everyone is entitled to their opinion about the merits of the many competing products in the smartphone industry, but when false statements of material fact are deliberately purveyed for the purpose of influencing the markets a red line has been crossed.”
BlackBerry said that sales of its new Z10 smartphone are meeting expectations. It also said that return rates are at or below forecasts, and in line with the industry.
“To suggest otherwise is either a gross misreading of the data or a willful manipulation. Such a conclusion is absolutely without basis and BlackBerry will not leave it unchallenged,” BlackBerry president and chief executive officer Thorsten Heins said in a release.
Those who wrote the report had this to say:
“We are confident in our research methodology and we welcome any regulatory inquiry,” the firm’s general counsel and chief compliance officer, Anne Buckley, said in a statement. “Detwiler Fenton is not the only research provider publishing similar reports regarding customer reactions, sales and returns of the BlackBerry Z10.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Nobody is going to put out a report like this if there wasn’t something to it. There’s too much to risk by making this stuff up. I’ve also said in the past that BlackBerry and some of their partners have put out statements about great sales, but they didn’t put numbers out to back it up. Perhaps it’s time to start putting out hard numbers. That would put an end to this quickly. That of course assumes that Z10s are actually selling and not being returned.
Oh well. At least BlackBerry sponsered Mercedes Benz F1 had a better day. Lewis Hamilton qualified on the pole for the Chinese Grand Prix tomorrow. At least something went right for BlackBerry.
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This entry was posted on April 13, 2013 at 3:41 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags BlackBerry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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BlackBerry News: None Of It Really Positive
So as I type this, I am watching Formula 1 qualifying from China which includes the Mercedes F1 team which is sponsored by BlackBerry. That’s ironic as I have BlackBerry news to report. Let’s start with a survey that has bad news for the smartphone maker. According to AllThingsDigital, 71% of consumers don’t want a BlackBerry:
The details: As part of its survey,* Raymond James asked respondents what features would make them more likely to buy a new iPhone or an Android or BlackBerry device: Bigger screen? Lower price? Better functionality? But it also offered them the option of saying they would never use a particular device. And plenty of respondents availed themselves of it.
Of the consumers Raymond James surveyed, 20 percent said they would never buy an iPhone, 31 percent said they’d never buy an Android phone, and 71 percent said they’d never purchase a BlackBerry.
Now, note the asterix. It’s there because of this fact: It only polled 250 consumers. So it’s not a huge sample size from a stats point of view. Still, it’s not good news if you’re trying to get consumers to buy your product.
Now there’s this news. Remember that analyst report that claimed that BlackBerry Z10s were being returned faster than they were being sold? BlackBerry wants security regulators to investigate:
The Waterloo, Ont.-based tech giant is calling on the Ontario Securities Commission and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to investigate the report by Detwiler Fenton & Co., a Boston-based financial services firm.
BlackBerry called the report “false and misleading” and said it was issued to deliberately affect the stock price.
“These materially false and misleading comments about device return rates in the United States harm BlackBerry and our shareholders, and we call upon the appropriate authorities in Canada and the United States to conduct an immediate investigation,” BlackBerry chief legal officer Steve Zipperstein said in a release issued Friday.
“Everyone is entitled to their opinion about the merits of the many competing products in the smartphone industry, but when false statements of material fact are deliberately purveyed for the purpose of influencing the markets a red line has been crossed.”
BlackBerry said that sales of its new Z10 smartphone are meeting expectations. It also said that return rates are at or below forecasts, and in line with the industry.
“To suggest otherwise is either a gross misreading of the data or a willful manipulation. Such a conclusion is absolutely without basis and BlackBerry will not leave it unchallenged,” BlackBerry president and chief executive officer Thorsten Heins said in a release.
Those who wrote the report had this to say:
“We are confident in our research methodology and we welcome any regulatory inquiry,” the firm’s general counsel and chief compliance officer, Anne Buckley, said in a statement. “Detwiler Fenton is not the only research provider publishing similar reports regarding customer reactions, sales and returns of the BlackBerry Z10.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Nobody is going to put out a report like this if there wasn’t something to it. There’s too much to risk by making this stuff up. I’ve also said in the past that BlackBerry and some of their partners have put out statements about great sales, but they didn’t put numbers out to back it up. Perhaps it’s time to start putting out hard numbers. That would put an end to this quickly. That of course assumes that Z10s are actually selling and not being returned.
Oh well. At least BlackBerry sponsered Mercedes Benz F1 had a better day. Lewis Hamilton qualified on the pole for the Chinese Grand Prix tomorrow. At least something went right for BlackBerry.
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This entry was posted on April 13, 2013 at 3:41 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags BlackBerry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.