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Blackberry is Still Ahead of Microsoft

When talking about Delphi XE5’s support for Android and iOS, someone usually asks if we plan to support Windows Phone, but never asks (that I’ve heard) if we plan to support Blackberry. In the news we keep hearing how Blackberry is struggling and losing market share, while Microsoft is fighting to gain market share. Interestingly Blackberry is still ahead of Microsoft.

Mobile Market Share

 

Looking at ComScore’s latest numbers we see Blackberry has 4.3% while Microsoft has 3.0%. Both are still in decline over the long haul. So even if Microsoft captured Blackberry’s 4.3% and Symbian’s 0.3% they would still only be at 7.6% compared to Android’s 51.8% and Apple’s 40.4%.

Microsoft has a way to go before they become a serious contender, and any other smartphone OS will be fighting an uphill battle to gain a foothold. With Microsoft’s deep pockets they could ride out a much longer storm than any upstart in this space, so I expect they are the only one who could turn up as an actual 3rd alternative.

15 replies on “Blackberry is Still Ahead of Microsoft”

Ever since Embarcadero began mobile development, I’ve asked repeatedly for Blackberry support, especially in C++Builder since Blackberry 10 devices and Blackberry Playbook tablets run C++-based apps (they also run Android apps, but current Delphi Android apps are not compatible because Blackberry does not support JNI yet). Blackberry is no longer a Java-based platform.

While it is nice to get that insight it’s also typical as well: US centric! It would be more helpful to base such posts on world wide statistics as they’d show even higher percentages for Android I guess.

Look here for some more updated data, that chart looks a bit too old: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/09/03/iphone_rises_android_slips_in_us_uk/
WP has a far better share in EU (where iOS is far lower), and unlike RIM, it’s backed by a huge company with a lot of cash (it spent 15billion to acquire a couple of companies…. CodeGear was sold for 30million, right? Guess MS CEO could have bought it swiping his credit card, without asking for the board consent…).
Anyway posts like this shows that when it comes to strategic decisions Emb uses guts and not its brain – and it can’t look beyond the US, unless it looks for developers, then cheap ones in Romania and Spain are better…

I agree, international data would be better, but that was what I had at the time I wrote the post. Thanks to the link for the Register. Those are shows sales, not market share, which explains the differences between the two data sources.

This chart and data I linked to were not used in making a strategic decision for Embarcadero. Those decisions were made over a year before these numbers were collected, and the decision to support iOS and Android are still are inline with the numbers the Register shows for anywhere in the world.

If you look at the mobile roadmap it shows Windows 8 RT/ARM in the “beyond” category.

http://edn.embarcadero.com/article/42544

The official published roadmap is a better source of information about Embarcadero’s strategic planning. My blog is where I share stuff I find interesting.

I find this pretty ignorant since this a US only situation. In other parts of the world iOS is nowhere as popular as in the US whereas Windows Phone has ascended to like 50% of the market share iOS has.

Also “latest data”. You’re showing a graph that ends with “Jan 2012”. That is now 20 months ago. Windows Phone 8 wasn’t even out then. I don’t know what to say.

I just hope WinRT appears somewhere in the future. I love Windows phones, and I know plenty of corporate clients that do so also, mainly because its unmatched Excel and Word support.

@Jim: Sorry for the confusion then. I saw the report itself had more recent numbers but thought you were refering to the above graph.
However, my first point still stands: I believe the US is a rather special case when it comes to mobile devices, you guys should also keep an eye on the international market situation and not just the country Embarcadero has its HQ 😉

Whether more users than Windows, supporting BlackBerry has little viability:

Below was posted on September 20, 2013:

BlackBerry Says It Will Fire 4,500 Employees, Lost Nearly $1 Billion Last Quarter, Stock Closes Down 17%

http://www.businessinsider.com/blackberry-cutting-4500-jobs-2013-9

Embarcadero would not be smart investing in BlackBerry. This would not fool me. Microsoft Phone is backed by no less than Microsoft/Nokia with deep pockets and the company delivers state-of-the-art tool chains for a complete vertical package (server, database, desktop and mobile clients).

@Jens: I agree, and I know they do look worldwide when making strategic decisions. What is that saying “You can please some of the people some of the time, but all of the people none of the time.” Even looking at worldwide numbers it will not be representational of every market or every users roadmap. I just came across that graph and found it interesting where BlackBerry and Microsoft were in relation to each other.

@Navid: Yes, BlackBerry seems on their way out.

I’m hopeful that WP8 picks up the BlackBerry market and becomes a strong 3rd contender, but they still have a long way to go in most markets.

However Blackberry runs on QNX. Developing for QNX is much bigger than just phones. There are agreements in place with large automakers using QNX for infotainment systems and even Garmin has licensed QNX. QNX also supports OpenGL and BB phones are also on ARM so if Firemonkey is so good, it shouldn’t be that hard of a port to support BB 10 devices.

I have loaded the lastest BB 10 leak and successfully loaded the Location sample from Delphi for Android and it runs with no problems. I am impressed!!! I hope the Embarcadero considers BB 10 at some point.

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