黑莓放棄最后的優勢

????黑莓（Blackberry）決定在其他手機平臺上提供其免費短信服務BBM，對于一家已經沒有什么可以失去的公司來說，此舉是其背水一戰的“絕望之舉”。BBM是在黑莓日益減少的用戶群體中用戶粘性最高的功能。公司希望通過將該功能免費提供給安卓（Android）和iOS用戶，擴大或至少維持一度利潤豐厚的生態系統。

????如今，指摘黑莓非常容易。過去五年，公司前一個管理團隊的拙劣表現，或許將成為商學院課堂上的經典負面教材，被一屆又一屆的學生們用來研究一家公司在面臨競爭時是如何坐以待斃的。但無論如何，現在的黑莓正處于上升期。公司股票比去年的最低點上漲了超過一倍，而且，經過兩年的發展（在科技界已經是很長時間）后，公司憑借最新推出的操作系統?Blackberry 10以及Z10、Q10和最近發布的Q5等幾款新手機，終于重回正軌。

??? 然而，盡管Blackberry 10系列的發布在近期引發了一些樂觀情緒，但在競爭激烈的消費類硬件領域，公司的市場份額仍在被使用谷歌（Google）安卓平臺的競爭對手不斷蠶食。據IDC周四公布的最新銷售數據顯示，今年第一季度，搭載黑莓操作系統的手機出貨量僅占市場份額的2.9%，比去年減少了35%。運行微軟Windows操作系統的手機首次超越黑莓，市場份額達到3.2%。而安卓與蘋果（Apple）iOS則聯手拿下了92%的市場份額，其中安卓的市場份額達到59%，比去年同期增長了80%。全球智能手機中，運行安卓系統的比例占75%。

????公平地說，第一季度的銷售數據僅反映了新黑莓手機在美國八天的銷量和在加拿大兩個月的銷量。但消費者對于黑莓產品的冷淡反應令人沮喪。比如沒有任何人徹夜排隊購買新Z1O。據報道，Z10手機在發布一個季度后，出貨量終于突破了100萬臺，這算不錯的表現，但對于一家擁有如此巨大的品牌認知度的公司而言，這并不值得慶賀。相反，去年九月，iPhone手機在發布后僅僅一周時間內的銷量便接近500萬臺。

????如今，黑莓手機能做的，在安卓手機上都能實現。沒有多少必備應用是僅在黑莓手機上運行的。實際上，黑莓似乎把應用開發空間拱手送給了谷歌，甚至它把Blackberry 10能夠運行安卓應用作為一個重大的賣點。

????不過，黑莓有一個消費者導向的功能，是其他設備制造商或移動平臺無法提供的——黑莓信息服務（BBM）。該服務允許黑莓用戶之間發送和接收信息，共享軟件，甚至交換音樂，而無線運營商不會對此收費。事實證明，在印尼、海地和尼日利亞等無線服務不太可靠的地區，該功能具有很高的用戶粘度。

????Blackberry's decision to make its free messaging service, BBM, available on other mobile phone platforms is a Hail Mary play for a damaged company that pretty much has nothing to lose at this point. By giving away the stickiest feature available to Blackberry's dwindling consumer base to Android and iOS users for free, the company is hoping that it will be able to expand, or at the very least maintain, its once lucrative ecosystem.

????It is extremely easy to bash on Blackberry (BBRY) these days. The bunglings of its former management team over the last five years will probably be studied in business schools for generations as how not to do just about everything. But Blackberry is on an upswing of sorts at the moment. Its stock has more than doubled from its lows hit last year, and after two years of development (light years in the tech world) the company is "back in the game" with the launch of its new operating system, Blackberry 10, and a few new handsets, the Z10, Q10, and the recently announced Q5.

????Yet despite the recent optimism over the launch of the Blackberry 10 series, the company will almost certainly continue to lose market share in the crowded consumer hardware space to rivals that use Google's (GOOG) Android platform. Phones shipped with the Blackberry operating system made up just 2.9% of mobile phones sold in the first quarter of this year, down 35% from last year, according to new sale numbers released by IDC on Thursday. Phones running Microsoft's (MSFT) Windows operating system outsold Blackberry for what appears to be the first time, capturing 3.2% of the market. But phones running either Android or Apple's (AAPL) iOS, captured 92% of all mobile sales -- with Android garnering 59% of the total market, an 80% increase from the same time last year. With that, Android now runs on 75% of the world's smartphones.

????To be fair, those first-quarter sales numbers just reflect eight days of sales for the new Blackberry phones in the U.S. and just a couple of months of sales in Canada. Nevertheless, the public's lukewarm reception to the product -- no one was camping out for the new Z10 -- isn't encouraging. The phone has reportedly passed the 1 million shipped mark in its first quarter of launch, which isn't bad, but isn't great for a company with such huge brand recognition. By contrast, nearly 5 million iPhones were sold in the first week of its launch back in September.

????There really isn't much you can do on a Blackberry that you can't do on an Android phone these days. There aren't a bunch of must-have apps that run exclusively on Blackberry, for example. Indeed, Blackberry seems to have surrendered the app development space to Google as it considers the new Blackberry 10's ability to run Android app clones as a major selling point.

????But there is one consumer-focused feature that Blackberry offers that no other handset maker or mobile platform has -- its Blackberry Messaging Service (BBM). The service allows Blackberry users to send and receive messages, share files, and even exchange music with other Blackberry users without incurring special messaging charges from their wireless carrier. It has proven to be very sticky in places like Indonesia, Haiti, and Nigeria where wireless service is unreliable.