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By Vijaykumar Meti: Subscribe to Vijaykumar's RSS feed | March 10, 2013 9:34 AM GMT
It is no more a secret that BlackBerry is aiming to regain its lost market share, which is currently dominated by Apple iPhone and Android-running devices. But when it comes for selling ultra-low cost BlackBerry smartphones in emerging markets like India and Indonesia, BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins says, he has no plans to compete with low-cost smartphone segments.
"Understand where you are playing and resist being talked into segments that you know will not serve your purpose and will not result in shareholder value," Heins said in a question-and-answer session at a conference in BlackBerry's hometown Waterloo. "You will not see us getting into the 50-, 60-buck phone segment. This is not BlackBerry," Bloomberg has reported.
Currently, BlackBerry is selling its flagship smartphone - BlackBerry Z10 in India with the unsubsidized price of Rs.43, 490 approx $800, and certainly attracting the interest of wealthy Indian consumers.
Heins added that cheaper smartphone powered by BlackBerry 10 operating system will go on sale later, but not in the $50 or $60 range.
"You will see new products being launched this year based on BlackBerry 10, all fully LTE-capable, the whole 10 yards that are more geared towards those price bands where people need to be," Heins said.
Meanwhile, he also stated that sales in emerging markets such as India and Indonesia are better than in Europe and North America.
It is certainly not a bad idea that BlackBerry is focused on the higher-end smartphone market as it aims to regain the market share, which is currently dominated by Apple's iPhone and Android devices specially the Samsung's range of Galaxy smartphone.
The company plans to continue with the success of devices, which runs BlackBerry 7 OS and older at the entry level market and this could be the reason for BlackBerry not entering into the mid- or entry-level smartphone market segment with BB10 devices. In effect, if one wants an inexpensive BlackBerry smartphone, the company suggests going with BlackBerry Curve or BlackBerry Bold which falls in the mid-range smartphone segment.
However, prior to the launch of BlackBerry 10 devices, it was announced that the company will launch up to six handsets running BB10 OS. If that's true, all six handsets will be premium devices targeting the high-end market segment.
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