Research In Motion's future has never been grimmer. The company behind the once behemoth Blackberry has seen its user base shrink considerably while the iPhone and Android continue to amass mainstream adoption. A new survey by Appcelerator reveals that developer's interest in developing new applications for the Blackberry is down by seven percent, even below Microsoft's Windows Phone 7, which is still a newcomer to the market, and crushed when in comparison with behemoths like Apple's iOS platform and the Android.
After a severe service outage, which began with a server failure in the UK that spread like wildfire to other continents like Africa and the Middle East, and with Google's recent announcement that it would stop supporting it's Blackberry Gmail App serving as an example how companies are losing interest in RIM's platform, the Blackberry's prospects for the future are starting to get darker.
And it seems that won't be changing anytime soon. Newly announced blackberry mobile phones , the Bold 9790 and Curve 9380, will be joining the OS 7 family over the next coming weeks,and , excluding the usual hardware upgrades, these new phones don't seem to offer the innovation that the company needs to reverse its luck.
It's investors are starting to get scared. Ironfire Capital's manager, Eric Jackson, has recently made the bold statement that he doesn't see the company survive past the first quarter of 2013.
Jackson blames the company's troubles on Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie, RIM's co-CEOs, stating that the company co-founders are going to drive the company straight into the ground, and that they won't change their ways over night, stating that RIM's a bad software company.
And some investors seem to agree.
With their revenues stagnating and their share of the market shrinking, Jaguar Financial Group's CEO, Vic Alboni, criticized the manufacturer of failing to inspire consumer enthusiasm and for failing to deliver their devices in the market.
Fears are that RIM might be following Nortel's footsteps, which in 2009 filed for protection from creditors in the United States to restructure its debt obligations, protection that has been extended to December of this year.
Once a behemoth on the mobile phone industry, RIM's now fights for its own survival. And they seem to be failing and accomplishing it.
