BlackBerry 10 Will Keep Company in Top 3 Spot for Enterprise, ABI Research Reports

BlackBerry is back ­­­­-- at least if the company’s new BlackBerry 10 smartphone is any indication. The struggling cell phone company held a private launch party in New York City on Wednesday, getting ready to release the phone and see whether it will float or sink.

Features of the new BlackBerry 10 include gesture-based OS navigation controls, simultaneous multi-app operation, multi-language support, and the next generation virtual keyboard.

The company previously announced features that would be implemented across all BlackBerry phones, which will also be on the BlackBerry 10, including BlackBerry Balance, BlackBerry World for Work and BlackBerry Hub.

The stakes are high for this phone to be a success, as enterprise practice director Dan Shey commented.

“BlackBerry needs strong backing from IT administrators, but it also needs enough consumers and more specifically, employees to choose BB10 over Android, Apple, and Windows smartphones,” said Shey. “The BYOD trend is having a big influence on enterprise mobilization strategies.”

At this point BlackBerry is in a good position when it comes to enterprise, so the real test will be whether the company’s recently released BES10 can rival other MDM platforms with its multi-device support features.

When it comes to consumers, it’s not exactly clear what the adoption rates for 2013 will be, but ABI Research predicts that by the year’s end, BlackBerry will secure the third spot in the world (which it currently holds) for the enterprise market.

BlackBerry phones are still a strong choice when it comes to business, and this is not likely to change over the course of this year, despite the competition BlackBerry faces from all sides, including Android (currently at number 2) and Apple (number 1).

What may help the BlackBerry 10’s performance and popularity could be pricing and promotion, as well as the phone’s ability to adapt to and leverage the ‘Internet of Things.’

“M2M or the Internet of Things is the next frontier for mobile and wireless computing,” added Shey. “BlackBerry’s QNX platform is a fantastic starting point for a stake in this market, but BlackBerry can’t fall behind in IoT as it did with touchscreen smartphones if it hopes to become a mobile computing platform company.”

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