BlackBerry Won't Be AT&T's 3rd Ecosystem

**Editor’s Note:


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for our list of February’s hottest selling smartphones to see how the BlackBerry Z10’s competition.**

Just as quickly as they jumped on the BlackBerry wagon before this week’s launch of the Z10 in the U.S., industry insiders are looking to hitch a ride with someone else.

BlackBerry, which recently changed its name from Research In Motion to match its smartphone brand, will unveil its quarterly financial results on Thursday, and is expected to shed some light on the performance of its new Z10 smartphone. The device is the first to run on the new BlackBerry 10 operating system. The Z10 has only been available in the U.S. for a few days, but it got a head start in Europe and Canada last month. While some outlets reported sellouts, most have pointed to a serious supply shortage as a reason for that.

While the signs don’t point toward a BlackBerry resurgence, analysts at Ovum say we should wait a little while longer before digging the company’s grave.

” … even though many observers will see this quarters performance as a referendum on BlackBerry 10, they should instead wait for the next quarters results, which will be a much better indicator of the long-term success or failure of the platform. Given that context, anything more than a million Z10 sales in the past quarter may be considered a success for BlackBerry. Anything less will be disappointing,” said Jan Dawson, chief telecom analyst at Ovum.

Sales of BlackBerry phones in two critical markets North America and Europe have waned in recent years as both general consumers and business users have turned to Apple’s iPhone and the many Android devices available. BlackBerry’s success has not declined as quickly in other regions.

While Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android dominate the global smartphone market, analysts are closely watching to see if there’s room for a successful third operating system. If it comes down to BlackBerry and Microsoft’s Windows Phone prevalent on phones such as Nokia’s Lumia series give the edge to Microsoft at this point, particularly in the U.S.

Even past the end of the quarter, the U.S. [BlackBerry] launch seems to have been very low key, with carriers not featuring the devices and sales staff poorly briefed on its benefits,” Dawson added. “AT&T, which has had big device launches with iPhones, Windows Phones and Androids in the recent past, hasnt lavished the same attention on the Z10. Based on executives comments, AT&T strongly believes that it needs a third ecosystem beyond iPhone and Android, but it clearly doesnt think BlackBerry 10 is it.”

A second phone based on BlackBerry 10, the Q10 featuring a traditional QWERTY keyboard is pending.

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