

RIM Takes $485M Hit Over Unsold PlayBook Tablets - gaoprea
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2397150,00.asp

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raganwald
Amateur hour really _is_ over:

[http://blogs-
images.forbes.com/marcwebertobias/files/2011/05...](http://blogs-
images.forbes.com/marcwebertobias/files/2011/05/playbook_4_400.jpg)

Amateurs could not possibly lose a half a billion dollars competing head-on
with a juggernaut and ignoring the obvious time and time again.

UPDATE: Enough snark. Here’s my post-moretm: They drank their own kool-aid.
Every single thing about it strikes me as the work of a team trying to sell to
their management rather than to the market. Or, the work of a team that was
only allowed to build what their management wanted to succeed rather than what
the market would reward with success.

Their advertising brags and boast of how awesome it is, but nobody who
actually talks to customers would believe that this is true or believable.
Management, on the other hand, might believe it is awesome if they were
reading the ad copy while looking at some incomprehensible PowerPoint with
fancy graphics.

Their choice of technologies and features hits the sweet spot of what the
company is prepared to fund rather than what customers are prepared to buy.

The whole thing seems inward-facing, a little like certain start-ups that are
buzzword compliant because that’s what VCs want to fund rather than because
that’s what markets want to buy.

~~~
jeremymcanally
100% spot on (from the outside, at least).

I think they were banking on their "huge market share" in mobile phones (that
has since began sinking down) to get buy in. "Oh I have a Blackberry I should
buy this thing." That's a good market to shoot for if there's a compelling
reason for the customer to do that, but I didn't see a single feature that
would really push someone to buy a Playbook over an iPad even as an existing
RIM customer.

~~~
function_seven
> but I didn't see a single feature that would really push someone to buy a
> Playbook over an iPad even as an existing RIM customer.

It's even worse than that. The useless thing couldn't do _email_. You know,
the one thing that made RIM a success in the first place? Yeah.

~~~
empire29
Could this have something to do w RIM management not wanting to canabalize
it's already dwindling BB phone market? I've never used one but the ppl I know
still clinging their BBs cite it's email capabilities as why they're sticking
around.

Tablets and phones don't seem to directly compete, but then again they're both
mobile devices.

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plusbryan
"Despite its troubles, the PlayBook is not going anywhere, RIM said."

If that's a direct quote, it's an unfortunate choice of words.

~~~
kin
Their CEO always says shit like this. It bottles my mind how much the CEO
believes in his products. IMO he's too optimistic and quite frankly needs a
hard smack of reality. That or he's just trying to keep investors at bay.

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lambersley
RIM's primary distribution channel is now proving to be more a barrier than
once thought. The sell-through approach using the Carriers as primary is
horrible. Carriers will promote and sell what is profitable and buzzing. In
recent weeks RIM has alllowed employees to purchase Playbook internally at a
discounted price (discount becomes taxable income). I know employees who have
purchased upwards of 20 devices for friends and families. It makes me wonder,
what if they were to open this up for all their devices? What if they'd done
this 3 years ago? Sure it would eat into their profit margins but it would
definitely increase market share and create stickiness (aka Crackberry).

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shin_lao
I own a Playbook and it's really, really a nice device. It's fast, browsing is
convenient, it can multi tasks, the form factor is better than the iPad and it
can be used as a mass storage on my PC. I've played with the iPad, the iPad2
and the Samsung Galaxy but I prefer the PlayBook.

The big problem: no apps.

~~~
benwerd
I've got a Playbook, and I completely disagree with you.

The lack of apps is a symptom, not a problem. The development environment is
very poor, the app store itself is slow and badly designed, and it's missing
important glue like Android's killer universal share screen.

They didn't want to cannibalize their phones, and missed the fact that their
phones are going away - and that phones, computers, tablets are turning into a
spectrum of connected devices that are expected to do more or less the same
things but in different form factors appropriate to different contexts.

The hardware itself is pretty awesome, so that's not at fault. And there are
neat UI touches like the active borders. But overall, it's just a terrible
operating system, and they didn't have a clue what it takes to create a
developer ecosystem. Even the apps they do have feel like cheap knock-offs.
Have you played Angry Apes?!

It's no wonder that RIM's now talking about pushing its enterprise lock-down
functionality - its only real selling point at this stage - to iPhones and
Android devices.

~~~
foobarbazetc
RIM will never win, because they're developer hostile.

The developer environment sucks, the APIs have always sucked, the signing
system has always sucked.

Keep in mind that until very recently, the BlackBerry OS had no way for you to
execute a HTTP request without implementing your own logic about which of the
500 different esoteric connectivity options you wanted to use. It's just a
clusterf*ck.

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matwood
Isn't it the Playbook that still can't check email, contacts, or a calendar
without being tethered to a Blackberry? I could have told you day one that was
going fail, doubly so if they were expecting their main customers to be
enterprises. "Hold on, let me plug my phone into my tablet to check my
schedule...wait, why do I have this tablet again?"

Hopefully they dump their CEO(s) and get someone who understands the current
and rapidly changing mobile and tablet markets. If not, RIMs days are
numbered.

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protomyth
Given the people who bought Blackberries, it would seem like an ARM-based
netbook with a really awesome keyboard and 3G would have been a better idea
for a first step outside the cellphone market. It really seems like the Storm
and Playbook were me-toos instead of looking at what makes RIM great and
pushing that.

~~~
masklinn
> Given the people who bought Blackberries

Depends on the country, Blackberries are mostly (to solely) corporate in the
US, but in Europe it tends to be used a lot by teenagers and young adults for
extensive messaging thanks to BBM + good keyboard.

On the other hand, I don't see how they'd get _that_ demographic a BB tablet,
so you probably have a good point.

~~~
astrodust
Their new market is heavy texters. Corporate US has all but given up on the
platform, with an avalanche of switching to Android and iOS.

If you want a cheap phone with an inexpensive text-messaging plan, RIM is your
go-to device.

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troymc
"...we believe the PlayBook, which will be further enhanced with the upcoming
PlayBook OS 2.0 software, is a compelling tablet for consumers that also
offers unique security and manageability features for the enterprise."

The device is named a "PlayBook" yet they're targeting the enterprise market.
That seems wrong. Did they start by targeting general consumers then shift
their target market without changing the device's name?

At least RIM is sticking to their guns and forging ahead with the device,
unlike the wishy-washy maybe-we-will-maybe-we-won't emanating from HP
regarding webOS.

~~~
sjs
A playbook is a book of strategies used by sports coaches. Typically in US
football.

~~~
Argorak
This is nice - if you know the meaning behind the term. But RIM is an
international company, so not all of their costumers know this all to well.

I as a non-native speaker was definitely not aware of the term, so my first
association was "play" - I am sure there are many more like me. This is
definitely an unfortunate choice of a brand name.

~~~
sjs
Fair enough, just providing some context.

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iamandrus
They have nobody to blame but themselves. They shipped the tablet too early
and without fully finishing it. Why should I need to own a BlackBerry in order
to utilize something as simple as email or BBM? Sure, it's a tablet that's
meant to be integrated with your smartphone but I should be able to buy it as
a standalone product as well. The only thing that can save them now is to
abandon the PlayBook and do a completely _new_ tablet that can actually gain
tablet market share.

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marknutter
It's called skating to where the puck was.

~~~
martingordon
Ironic, considering they're a Canadian company.

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daimyoyo
Given RIM's atrocious performance and the fact they've been hemmorhaging
customers for a long while, where's the shareholder revolt? The board might
not see the obvious, but surely the investors in RIM can see that when a
company loses some 80% of it's value, something needs to change.

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parfe
Did anyone who owns an IPhone or Android smart phone decide to buy a Playbook?
I still can't believe RIM insists on stick to their own OS rather than
building their features onto android, joining that ecosystem, and putting out
quality hardware.

~~~
zmonkeyz
Spoken like someone who doesnt use one. The OS of the Playbook has as much in
common as android does to Windows. As a tablet OS it is actually very good.
Putting Android on it would be a downgrade imo.

~~~
parfe
>Spoken like someone who doesnt use one.

Obviously I don't use one. No one uses one.

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scrame
A coworker had a playbook. He said he "was _not_ disappointed". The selling
feature was that the OS looked like OSX, as opposed to "the usual crappy
android UI".

He didn't really have an answer for why he didn't just get an iPad if he wants
something like OSX on it.

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rbanffy
I'd buy one for US$ 50, tops. ;-)

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CMT
Lower the price by 40% and all the problems will be resolved.

~~~
eli
I'm pretty sure that only solves one of the problems, actually.

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clojurerocks
Ya lower prices. Make it like 99 dollars or something and it will sell like
hotcakes. Or hell even cheaper.

~~~
Samuel_Michon
It "worked" for HP's TouchPad. They lost $500 on every device, but at least
they finally sold those tablets.

So how about giving those PlayBooks away with a box of Cracker Jack's? There
must be some kids who want a tablet that can't send email and doesn't have any
games.

