Tuesday, March 7, 2006
Trouble Not Over For RIM?
Posted by Ed Hansberry in "THE COMPETITION" @ 02:00 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/06/technology/06rim.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Research In Motion just cleared a big hurdle in the road by settling with NTP for a huge wad of cash, but their troubles may not be over.
"The patent case was a whole bunch of noise," said Ellen Dailey, a Forrester Research analyst. "Right now, R.I.M. is in danger of relegating itself to becoming a niche e-mail player." David Schatsky of Jupiter Research echoed that view. "The lawsuit was an active threat to R.I.M.," he said. "But they now have to face other, long-term challenges. Microsoft appears determined to be a serious competitor in its markets."
The Blackberry is a good, simple email device, which is exactly what some want. However, when it comes to attachments, web browsing, music, feature rich third party application, well, the Blackberry falls short. Of course, few want all of those things, but companies like Palm, and major carriers are betting their users want some of those things. Will RIM be able to take the zen of Blackberry to the next level and survive the onslaught by Microsoft, or will it go the way of another simple OS that kept crying "simple" while it quietly sank into oblivion?
Research In Motion just cleared a big hurdle in the road by settling with NTP for a huge wad of cash, but their troubles may not be over.
"The patent case was a whole bunch of noise," said Ellen Dailey, a Forrester Research analyst. "Right now, R.I.M. is in danger of relegating itself to becoming a niche e-mail player." David Schatsky of Jupiter Research echoed that view. "The lawsuit was an active threat to R.I.M.," he said. "But they now have to face other, long-term challenges. Microsoft appears determined to be a serious competitor in its markets."
The Blackberry is a good, simple email device, which is exactly what some want. However, when it comes to attachments, web browsing, music, feature rich third party application, well, the Blackberry falls short. Of course, few want all of those things, but companies like Palm, and major carriers are betting their users want some of those things. Will RIM be able to take the zen of Blackberry to the next level and survive the onslaught by Microsoft, or will it go the way of another simple OS that kept crying "simple" while it quietly sank into oblivion?
