Blackberry Bites the Dust - Yeah, we saw that one coming a LONG time ago

Ok this was so obviously in the cards. Blackberry announced it will stop making its own smartphones and now seeks to have Blackberry branded Android phones made by some licensed third party. RIP BB. Of the smartphone brands in the Top 10 from just six years ago, at the start of year 2010, when I pronounced we're entering the 'Bloodbath' only 3 brands remain in the Top 10 (Samsung, Apple and LG). So Nokia, Blackberry, Ericsson, Motorola and Palm are dead (although Nokia about to come back). HTC and Sony remain far outside the Top 10. Sharp only sells in Japan anymore. Sammy and Apple are pretty safe to dominate the smartphone space with Huawei of China, LG.. not that certain, they have had their ups and downs. LG could go the way of Sony if things don't improve. Sony meanwhile, it looks like the next HTC. And HTC, gosh its obviously the next Blackberry.

Comments

[John A]

We will see about Sony. Seems they will get a succés with the new flagship Xperia XZ after all. Their best model for a long time. And the Samsung brand have probably been hurt for some time with the Note 7 "battery gate" issue.

And some new Interesting brand coming to like LeEco. And one brand that I think are exiting Vernee.
(Vernee.cc)

So I am not sure the sort of Samung/iPhone duapoly will last forever. But time will tell.

[cornelius]

@who
>"Who gives a shit"

You don't. You keep it all. That's why you are full of it. You stink the joint. Go ask your mommy to change your diapers.

[Huber]

@John A: "
We will see about Sony. Seems they will get a successs with the new flagship Xperia XZ after all."

I wouldn't bet money on this. Sony, like LG and HTC, doesn't know how to market their devices - or simply lack the money.

The Sony Xperia X compact is a step back from the Compact devices of old (like the Z5 Compact), because it doesn't use the Snapdragon 820 (650 instead IIRC). _THE_ advantage of the old Sony compact devices was that they shared the SoC and the camera with their bigger versions (unlike e.g. Samsung).

I know some people who bought the compacts in the past because of this reason, they wanted a smaller high-end phone.

But did Sony market this at all? Did the average customer know this? I doubt that!

On top of it, the whole Sony X line is late to market - if they would have released the devices in April alongside the SGS7, LG G5 and HTC 10, it would be different. But now the Snapdragon 820 is news from yesterday.

Next year, I bet they will be in the same situation like this year in the spring - I needed a new phone back then, but I would not have touched the Sony Z5 with its outdated SoC when the competition was already offering phones with the new one.

I bought the Sony Xperia Z2 Tablet in April 2014, it still is a very good device: It was one of the fastest back then, is water-proof, has front facing stereo speakers, gives me about 10 hours of screen on time with a single charge, is very light and thin, supports SD-cards and its Android version is close to AOSP.

But I have never ever seen any effort from Sony to market these points. The average customer knows Apple and Samsung, Sony usually is not on the list. Has Sony even released a new tablet in 2016? I think they are leaving this market now.

This product-oriented marketing is like in the 19th century - build a good product and the customers will come automatically. But in the 21st century this doesn't work anymore, you need more effort to be successful.

Sony will scew up more and more. They will be remembered as the Android OEM which went down despite releasing good products, simply because they don't understand marketing.

[ChrisB]

Firefox is now officially dead: http://www.osnews.com/story/29414/Mozilla_ceases_all_Firefox_OS_development

[ChrisB]

I meant to say Firefox OS, of course.

[John A]

@Huber

I dont think Sony are so late. It will not be som much difference between Snapdragon 820 and 821 after all anyway. (and they recently included MediaTek in their phones to, in Xperia XA) MediaTek catching up on Qualcomm/Snapdragon even in the high end. Would not be suprised if Sony go for them the next time for the most expensive phones. Maybe with MediaTek Helio X30 or some similar Soc.s. And for the Xperia X Compact, what I have seen it have been snappy and fast even without Snapdragon 820.

And I think it make no sense to IP classified all devices by increased building cost, people are just to stupid and go swimming in saltwater with their Sony phones with much warranty issues to handle. It are meant to be waterprotected but not use in those scenarios. So I think Sony did the right thing to reserve IP classification for the flagships only. Samsungs touchwiz slows down the phone over time, Sony going for a more "stock" Android approach.

Some may find it booring but I personally like a more close to stock Android experience.

Sony may not make much promoting/commercials with their phones in the US market but here in Europe I see more of it.

They included a pair of quite expensive headphones bundled with the phone if you pre-order Xperia XZ here.
Like in UK or Sweden for example.

And finaly they produced a excellent camera in their flagship XZ that are in basicly as same level with iPhone 7 or the best Samsungs got at the moment. Previous Xperia Z5 models or Xperia Performance had good cameras on "paper" but produced relativly poor pictures, not in same quality as Samsung or iPhones.

When the tablet market going down I see not realy a point to release a new Sony tablet. I think Phablets have taking a lot of that market.

Overall I think the Sony phone division is back on track so to speak. But of course they can screws things up. But I think they have learned their lesson.

[Aaron Abraham N]

HTC just released a new mid ranger HTC Desire 10 and that phone has finally managed to convince me that the company has no clue nor chance to launch any sort of comeback save for launching an astonishing new flagship.
Reason why HTC Desire convinced me this because the phone has Snapdragon 400 processor ie the very same processor found in the old Lumia 630.

[Huber]

@John A:

"I dont think Sony are so late. It will not be som much difference between Snapdragon 820 and 821 after all anyway."

I see this differently: I actually did not buy a Sony device in the spring because they had outdated hardware (Snapdrageon 810 vs. 820). So I think it _IS_ paramount to release a new phone in spring, when the new SoC is out.

The same will happen next year if Sony again releases their new models so late - who wants to have a Snapdragon 820 device when the 830 is already released?

"Sony may not make much promoting/commercials with their phones in the US market but here in Europe I see more of it."

I'm also from Europe and I see nothing from them.

"They included a pair of quite expensive headphones bundled with the phone if you pre-order Xperia XZ here."

Yes, this surely will lure tons of Apple- and Samsung-customers over to Sony. Or not, as always.

"And finaly they produced a excellent camera in their flagship XZ that are in basicly as same level with iPhone 7 or the best Samsungs got at the moment"

And the average customer still doesn't know this. Sony is just an also-ran brand in mobile. They always had good cameras, by the way. This never has helped them at all.

"When the tablet market going down I see not realy a point to release a new Sony tablet. "

We are looking at a market which sells more than 200 Million devices per year. It's not as big as the smartphone market, but it surely is a market where Sony could make money - if tehy would play their cards right, which they don't.

[John A]

@Huber:

Sony recently invested in a new mobile factory in Thailand, from GSM Arena:

"The initial investment of several billion yen will give Sony the opportunity to start mass producing smartphones there starting in fiscal 2016. Initially the factory will have an output of several million units per year."

I dont think you make a huge investment like that if you not have a long term plan to stay in mobile.
But we will see the outcome over the coming months/years of course.

HTC is in a worse shape than Sony in my opinion. But maybe be will be "saved" by Google and the new Pixel devices.

And for the recently new Chinese brands its a lot of going on. Many think OnePlus will be the next "big brand". But they using OxygenOS and have been quit slow on updates.

My bet on some of the "new Chinese" brands will be Vernee, not just because of the hardware,but they have a good track record on software updates so far unlike many other Chinese brands. And also promise to get Android 7.0 to their slightly older devices like Vernee Apollo Lite. The brand is not even one year old yet but have announced 4 smartphones so far. Thor, Apollo Lite, Mars and a "flagship" called Apollo.
(They was a ODM manufacturer before)

So I think the smartphone war is still going on are not settled between Apple/Samsung.

For Microsoft/Windows Phone they are basicly dead even if they still updating Windows 10 Mobile. But the apps are not coming or will be pulled out one after another.

[Wayne Borean]

Sailfish 2.02 is now out. Too bad about Firefox OS, and Blackberry hardware. I like having a range of options.

[Wayne Borean]

This is the rich man's way to treat an iPhone

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/1880555/heres-what-happened-when-an-iphone-7-was-dropped-from-the-worlds-tallest-building/

[Tomi T Ahonen]

Hi Everybody

I've just posted new blog with a brief update of smartphone news, with the Tizen Huawei smart watch news, the Nokia D1C prelim internal specs, the slow death of Windows/Lumia continuing and some GSMA numbers on unique mobile users. Enjoy.

Tomi Ahonen :-)