BlackBerry’s latest fiscal report shows that the company sold 1.1 million phones in the past quarter… which wouldn’t sound so bad if it weren’t for the fact that the company sold 2.6 million phones during the same period a year ago.

But while BlackBerry has started developing software and services for Android, iOS, and Windows users, declining sales aren’t leading the company’s CEO to consider exiting the smartphone hardware business just yet.

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CEO John Chen says he still thinks there’s money to be made in hardware. Whether future hardware is running BlackBerry OS or Android remains to be seen though.

BlackBerry has been making some big changes as it continues to lose market share to Android and iOS. The company’s BlackBerry Messenger software is now available for other smartphone platforms. BlackBerry 10 devices now support Android apps from the Amazon Appstore. BlackBerry recently partnered with Samsung on a security-focused Android tablet. And the BlackBerry Experience Suite will bring more BlackBerry features to competing platforms.

It’s not hard to imagine a future where BlackBerry is known primarily as a company that develops security and communications software and services for other platforms. But the company has sunk a lot of money into its own hardware and operating system, and it’s not surprising that Chen isn’t ready to give up on that just yet. At the very least, BlackBerry phones with BlackBerry software serve as a showcase for what the company has to offer, much like a Google Nexus phone shows off Google’s vision of a pure Android experience.

Overall revenue for BlackBerry during the first quarter of the company’s 2016 fiscal year was $658 million, but there was a net loss of $28 million. That’s a bit lower than analysts had been expecting, and below the $966 million in revenue the company brought in a year earlier.

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8 replies on “BlackBerry: We’ll keep making phones, despite declining sales”

  1. I don’t understand why Blackberry is unwilling to sell their flagships on the largest Business mobile provider in North America, Verizon. Literally all the fortune 500 companies use Verizon for their business mobile data and company phones. You wanna revitalize your business, service your core audience.

    1. because all major carriers are refusing to sell blackberry because they dont sell at all

  2. As a Canadian I want this company to finally just roll over and die. They are a decade behind everyone else, they have nothing of value and their phones are junk. Its the dead parrot nailed to the perch of the technology world, and these guys just simply do not get how much of a dinosaur they are.

  3. Blackberry software on Android??? Have you tried Blackberry Messenger on Android? It is clunky, much harder to use than most other chat apps, and users constantly get spammed. No thanks.

  4. Of course they’ll keep making phones.The question is will the people keep buying them?

  5. Greedy BB still doesn’t get it. Over-priced devices, over-priced mult-layer ball-and-chain contracts, and last but certainly not least, they gave the key to your privacy away to the Government without a real fight. At least that’s the way it is here in Indonesia – one of BB’s largest markets.

  6. Holy moly what a useless company. Somebody please tell Terrance and Phillip to stop making the crappy cell phones.

    It’s not hard to imagine a future where BlackBerry goes away forever.

    Crapberry! Say it with pride.

    Their latest phone looks like it came out of a Decepticon’s anus.

  7. My guess is Chen thinks they can get enterprise too buy the hardware. It won’t be much but maybe enough to keep making phones.

    I think that will be a slow end to their hardware. They need to focus on the end consumer.

Comments are closed.