BlackBerry hedged against the iPhone. Revenue peaked. Then share fell to 0.5%.
In 2008 BlackBerry answered the iPhone with the Storm, a touchscreen built to keep the keyboard's click. Revenue peaked at $19.9B in fiscal 2011. Then share fell to 0.5% by early 2014.
Transcript
In late 2008, BlackBerry had to decide whether to make its own best product obsolete.
It could pour money and its best engineers into a touchscreen that made keyboard phones obsolete. Or it could hedge. It hedged, with the Storm: a screen that physically pressed down, to keep the click of a keyboard.
It did not work. Verizon had to replace almost all of the roughly one million units shipped. Balsillie later admitted: with Storm, we tried to do too much.
Here is why the hedge looked safe. BlackBerry's revenue kept climbing, to $19.9 billion in fiscal 2011, up 33% from the year before.
Then the floor gave way. From roughly 20% of the global smartphone market, BlackBerry's share fell for seventeen straight quarters, to 0.5% by early 2014, and effectively zero by 2016.
What BlackBerry gave up was not one phone. It gave up the chance to lead the touchscreen era, to protect the keyboard it already sold.
If you are hedging against your own replacement, do not read rising revenue as proof you are safe. It can be the last good year. Watch which product new buyers choose.
The records behind this video
Every figure in the video comes from this Decision Record, each with its sources.
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