Blackberry Is Staging a Comeback
In its heyday, Blackberry made status symbols, not smartphones. The wonders of instant messaging and on-the-go email access led millions upon millions of aspiring businesspeople to arm themselves with the pocketable handsets. The brand’s addictive devices were even coined “crackberry’s” at their peak in 2010 after shares rallied 7,500% from their penny stock beginnings. You’d be a fool to bet on any other tech start-ups with fruit-inspired names, surely!
Out of the blue, Steve Jobs’ innovative leaps rattled Blackberry. The company was slow off the line to cheat on the QWERTY keyboard and design something touchscreen, so with its grip on smartphone market slipping, Blackberry panic-designed the wrong products for the wrong end markets. Nearly all investors’ gains evaporated within four years, and the former giant was reduced to a mere footnote.
“Because it’s Blackberry,” investors have always remained skeptical. However, turnaround-guru John Chen believes he’s a CEO on the cusp of an extraordinary comeback with the company. Tellingly, Chen left out phone revenue when sharing quarterly results with investors last time out, focusing instead on fast-growing markets like cybersecurity and crisis communications. He expects revenue to grow 23-27% in 2020, hyping up Blackberry as “the name marketing people dream about!”
Hmm, Wall Street still sees this as a high-risk case of mind over matter. However, at least for the first time, the upside is in view! Would you trust Blackberry with your invested money?
