RIM addresses Dell’s plan to ditch BlackBerry

By on Nov 5, 2010 at 9:00 PM
mobile November 5, 2010

In an interview published Friday, Dell CFO Brian Gladden stated that the company would be ditching its cache of approximately 25,000 BlackBerry handsets and replacing them with Dell smartphones. The news comes ahead of Dell’s Venue Pro launch, which is scheduled to take place later this month in the U.S. Following Gladden’s comments that Dell would likely save 25% on communication costs by dumping BlackBerry smartphones and servers, RIM has issued a response. “We find it highly unlikely that they will actually save any money with this move and far more likely they were looking for a little free publicity,” RIM’s Senior Vice President of Corporate Marketing Mark Guibert told Dow Jones Newswires in an email. The company’s response is short and to the point, though it doesn’t really address the fact that BlackBerry devices often require more expensive data plans than other smartphones. Businesses that use BlackBerry handsets also incur additional costs associated with BlackBerry Enterprise Servers.

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  • http://www.facebook.com/people/William-Diaz/100000639956723 William Diaz

    Quite possibly this is a time when RIM negotiates with mobile carriers for tiered data plans. This is also a time when RIM may want to lower the price, or include in the price their BlackBerry Enterprise requirement for large companies.

    Personally, I dont see why we even have to have a BlackBerry plan on our accounts. Data is data is data to me.

    • Anonymous

      I agree with you mostly. But paying for rims “data” ensures security and privacy using their enterprise servers. Hence why BB is known for their security and privacy. I dont use my android for business, so in that case – data is data to me, too.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/William-Diaz/100000639956723 William Diaz

        BlackBerry is moving more consumerist then business now, and I dont see the need to pay for this type of security when most people arent traveling for business as much anymore – thus no need to secure phones on the go.

      • Anonymous

        God I hope your don’t work in any corporate IT function. I passed your comment by our security and compliance officers and they thanked me for the good laugh.

        Mobile security is one of the most important foundations any company should have as they expand the mobility efforts.

      • Anonymous

        @ mobileadmin.. Your compliance officers are working on Sat. interesting. How often do you pass random blog comments to break up tedious hours of administrating mobile compliance?

      • Anonymous

        @Celz ..

        The beauty of an enterprise solution like Blackberry is it intergrates with other enterprise platforms. Our entire Blackberry deployment is hooked into Office Communication Server and provides presence information. Easy to identify who’s online or not.

        Your really think working in enterprise IT you get weekends off? hah

    • Flnetman62

      Do you realize that you are all lookign at this as a US-centric view? We pay the highest rates for internet access, Canada has some of teh highest data rates. In other countries the carriers mark up BES even higher with a $40 – $50 difference between BIS and BES.

      who determines taht price? THE CARRIER. RIM does not determine the rates cahrged by the carriers.

      • Anonymous

        If RIM cant influence the prices charged that means they have no Juice.. Apple wouldn’t go for that shyt, and I doubt Google would too.. When you have a boring device like your average BB or a Kin the carriers do what’s best for them not whats best for you.. And if the device was awesome like an iPhone or an Evo people wouldnt mind paying a few extra bucks…

      • Anonymous

        No Apple and Android just don’t bother with the security aspects and force companies to require other middleware solutions to enable needed security / management. The cost when all said and is a wash.

        Did you really just compare a BB to a KIN? Maybe you should use a Blackberry and get educated.

      • Anonymous

        Used plenty of BB’s they have a great functionality, an uninspired OS, and outdated hardware. Where as the Kin had great hardware, a poorly thought out OS, and critical missing features. To demand a higher price point like most BB plans you normally need to do more than one thing right. I use Android and even though it’s more functional than iOS or WebOS for a business user its obvious working from the OS was an afterthought. I was never into BB’s, I was a WinMo user and prefer function over form; but when the big three of old Symbian, WinMo, and BB are either retired or dropping brand new phones that need to be, it’s hard to imagine them catching any public mindshare. Today I was in West LA at a Coffee Bean by The Grove, one of the trendiest places in L.A., and a gentlemen was using the newest BB out and it looked about a two years old. Even if he would have had a Torch that’s not a much better phone; its lower specced than the Pre which came out decades ago in phone years. So in short RIM needs to step it up or they will find themselves made into the carriers Bitch. If your product isn’t flyin off shelves you have no leverage in negotiating anything much like the ill fated handset that was dis-KIN-tinued… (sorry had to throw that in there)

  • Anonymous

    Suck it up RIM…

    • Majarvis

      Uhhh… BlackBerry devices require *LESS* data than other smartphones, because of their data encryption and streaming through RIM servers.

      Get it right, BGR…

      • Visual Mofo

        Lies!

      • Majarvis

        How about you go learn something, and get back to me…

      • jason6g

        I agree that the consume less data.

        however, i believe they are referring to the data plan pricing. instead of a $30 bis account, one often needs a $45 bes account.

        when you are doing a company account, and lets say 100 iphones/androids/wp7 would run you $3,000 a month, with no special server crap, and a blackberry runs you $4,500 a month with special server interfaces and all the other “bonuses” that blackberries have over simpler more effective solutions, it is a shame that rim still holds on to their current positions.

        only a matter of time before people bite the bullet on their bes purchases and give in to their employees demands for iphone/android/wp7 support from IT, heck look at sales declines the past year. not to mention, why would a landscaping or drywall business care about encryption… any company that cares about information security (health care for one) has their own encryption and security policies.

      • Anonymous

        You sir are wrong. Please read about State of MA CMR-17a which deals about protection of consumer data. This regulation applys to EVERY business regardless if it’s a hair salon or global corporation. Similar regulations are in place in Nevada, CA,FL and New York. Many states are looking to enact similar controls.

        Any company that cares about encryption (and all should considering the rate of data theft, devices lost / stolen) so you have very few options.. RIM’s provide end to end solution or ActiveSync which can enforce encryption but very few devices can enforce (Windows Mobile 6+, iPhone OS 3.1+) Android has only basic security controls. Why do you think so many companies are standing up secondary middleware solutions (Good Technology, MobileIron etc) – THEY REQUIRE ENCRYPTION!!) and guess what .. Good requires a pricey CAL, it’s own servers and Verzion / Sprint force you to use an enterpise data plan. The data plan cost is out of RIM’s hands so unsure why they get railed for it. Carriers love it as it’s a ongoing additional fee they can collect.

        BES Express works with a consumer plan, you lose OTA activation though so deployment is a little clunky.

        So any corporation doing any ROI / TCO on mobile support I pray they have some intelligent people involved that live and support mobile devices and understand true costs not marketing hype by a vendor looking to get in the space and sell their own services.

  • Anonymous

    So denial isn’t just a river in Egypt…

  • Swetrita

    So Dell shouldn’t ditch BB and use their own phones? Wake up RIM, you guys are two steps back.

    • Anonymous

      More like 2 years.

  • Bringit

    How soon before BGR has “RIM: Throwback Thursday”?

  • Anonymous

    Translation: “Fuck.”

    • http://twitter.com/mfg68 Matt Galo

      I laughed out loud pretty damn hard when I read this. I wish I could “like” more than once.

  • Blather

    blackberry response please. no response is needed you are losing yet more business. my company dumped blackberry a year ago

  • McHale

    Look who’s looking for the publicity. All I know is, my company has been running Windows Smartphones using ActiveSync 100% free. To move to BES, we’d have to buy a BES server and pay a crapload of licensing fees. We won’t even get into the fact that every smart device seems to handle ActiveSync by default with the exception of DingleBerries.

    • Anonymous

      This is pure FUD. ActiveSync is not free. You need Exchange CAL and depending on the policy level you want (Standard or Enterprise) require TWO CAL which are more expensive then a BES CAL. Which is has been noted (which everyone seems to just ignore) BES Express is free and offers much more management and security then ActiveSync.

      Your also spreading further FUD as every device doesn’t just handle ActiveSync. Which policies can you enforce on Android? Until 2.2 NONE!!! so no security. 2.2 only supports a small amount of the standard CAL EAS policy. iPhone is still only using the standard EAS ones as well.

      EAS provides you ZERO management of smartphones it’s a email connector / basic policy enforcement. I shudder to think of the nightmare managing a few hundred devices with EAS not to mention 25k. I’m thinking this will be a short lived project at Dell when they realize this.

      It seems the majority of blogsphere are users / consumers who have never worked in day in corporate IT.

      • MicroNix

        Any company running smart phones in a large environment already has some kind of 3rd party mgmt software. And that software allows them to manage more than one vendor normally which allows them a CHOICE of what they want to allow. The mgmt software isn’t anywhere near what it costs to run an enterprise BES environment either. Not to mention your email routes from the company’s exchange server to the devices instead of your exchange server, to RIM to your devices (RIM is a point of failure that has caused outages more than once!) Also, the free BES Express has no on-site redundancy features which if you’ve ever maintained any of these systems in an enterprise environment would know is critical. If execs don’t get their email, someone’s head is on a chop block. But you already know this, right? This means you need BB Enterprise server which costs plenty more than Exchange CALs. Seems there really *are* a lot of users in the blogsphere that never worked a day in corporate IT.

      • Anonymous

        Care to offer any of those third party management tools? I know of one that cost more than BES, but I’m not aware of any that will provide the level of security and control BES offers. Just curious.

  • George

    RIM is comprised of noting but moronic assholes.

  • DingleBerry

    Well….Come on RIM……They will be using DELL smartphones and not RIM! Im sure thewould want to usetheir own branded equipment. Im sure that DELL is using DELL computers and not……lets say…HP! It only makes sense.

    • Anonymous

      Lets see how quickly Dell is expunged from all RIM datacenters. I’ve seen this before. I worked for a company that used Dell because Dell used our companies services. Dell changed service providers, and within a year all our dell devices were swapped out.

  • http://twitter.com/brswa Brandon

    Well, that’s kind of a douchey thing to say, RIM. How about “We’re sorry to see them transition to their own devices, but wish them the best” How dare Dell use DELL devices.. The nerve..

  • Anonymous

    for a long time, i was pretty sure RIM could stay out of the smartphone wars as long as it continued to cater to its corporate base. but today, the level of competition in the consumer smartphone market has heated up to the point where all OS developers (MS, Apple, Google, Nokia) are likely to target whatever sector of the market they can get, and it’s not surprising that MS would be lining up corporate accounts in their sights.

    RIM need to move fast to hold on, whether it be through discounts on BES fees or faster phones with better browsing and email capability (and better battery life), or whatever. They really don’t seem to have a choice now, and have been complacent for a while, pretty much re-releasing phones with very few new features. They need to focus on phones rather than tablets. Core competences always come first.

  • Flnetman62

    Blackberry servers compress all the data, sometimes 50% – 80% less data traffic than Windows Mobile, Android and iPhones. Blackberry phones can run in sub 150 mb per month data space, reducing data costs further with tiered data plans. Compression also means less transmitted data, meaning battery is on less, meaning longer battery life. Compression also reduces roaming data costs.

    Windows 7 – has none of these. In fact Microsoft SCUM-DUM requires numerous servers with additonal encryption adn compression software and 8 pages of firewall port settings compared to a BES server using 1 port on the firewall.

    Smart move Dell, but then again they have to use their own products. Who else is going to use Windows Mobile 7?

    • Jeff

      Saying receiving a smaller amount of encrypted data vs a larger amount of unencrypted data uses less battery is arguable. I haven’t run any tests but if it gets encrypted data, it has to use more CPU decrypting them which uses more battery. Which uses more I honestly can’t say its possible the encrypted data still uses less, It’s also possible you could put a BB user on a lower data plan since it will have less data, but from my experience a lot of employees like to abuse it and start surfing the web and all sorts of other stuff. My last company just gave up trying to get people to stop going over there data usage and put everyone on unlimited plans.

    • GMann

      Unfortunately, if a company is using blackberries to access a corporate server, they are typically required to go on a higher data plan. Since you mention 150 mb threshold, I’m assuming you are referring to VZW new price plans. VZW requires any customer who is using BB’s on a BES/BESx to sign up on a $44.99/month data plan, regardless of how much data usage the customer actually requires.

  • Slashdpc

    There’s this free enterprise server RIM put out a few months ago. It’s called Blackberry Enterprise Server Express. Unless your company is innovative enough to run a encrypted custom application or wants to be able to transfer a recorded conference call from a cell phone to a voip pbx based phone, then BESX will work just fine for you and your company.

    In my opinion, the overall logic for Blackberry infrastructure being expensive is horribly flawed.

    • rederikus

      What you say is true but a company running any new server does incur extra costs.

      I needs a PC host on which to run it, a UPS and, a trained system manager to run and administrate this server. The server needs all the other needs of a corporate server such as backups and whatnot.

      The main advantage of BES and BESX is that the cell phone administarion is brought in-house. The carrier only has to provide a transport mechanism and some companies like this.

      This is a brave move by Dell since Windows Mobile 7 is a new OS and must surely have teething troubles. I agree with RIM that this is mainly a publicity stunt but there must surely be a large slice of corporate pride and ego in their decision to use their own products.

      If a Dell sales person is trying to sell Dell phones to a company and is himself seen to be using a BlackBerry, he will have a hard time convincing his client to buy any Dell products let alone phones.

      On the other hand if is well known (as now) that his whole company is using its own products then the sales person has a very good selling point – provided that it all works, of course.

    • Mbeernicholas84

      And the story ends here…..
      Job well done pointing that out! *slow clap*

  • http://bit.ly/samirsshah समीर शाह

    Reset.

  • Jokernj

    Dell dog-fooding, same as Microsoft.

  • xima

    it would have been better if they had just wished Dell good luck..
    .. and comment the day the company makes a headline having problems with their new gadgets.

  • Anonymous

    Hey RIM,

    PUT UP OR SHUT UP.

  • Max

    Another nail in RIM’s coffin. Soon every large company will follow suit.

  • Anonymous

    Crash + Burn = RIM

  • ReadingMore

    Wow, I didn’t know that Dell was RIM’s only customer…. I dropped my iPhone the other day, I wonder if Apple will survive?

  • Retrodude

    Lot of hate for Rim today.

    Mind you the kids don’t have school today.

  • http://strategemobile.com antoinelamarre

    “it doesn’t really address the fact that BlackBerry devices often require more expensive data plans than other smartphones”

    From what i’ve seen Blackberrys have a cheaper plan than most smartphones

    • Anonymous

      Most businesses use BES if they use blackberry’s so it cost them more money

      • Anonymous

        Companies pay for security. It cost them a lot less than a lost phone with hundreds of e-mails loaded on the device with username/password/PCI/PII/etc. data. It’s amazing what people send in e-mails, and how east it is to break into iOS/Android.

  • Neoprimal

    I find it odd that BIS is $29-$39 here in the US and ~$19 in Jamaica….and that’s the prepaid cost. The on-contract cost is roughly $15. For that you get unlimited (grossly compressed) data, BBM, IMing, etc.
    Granted, on ATT and Sprint you can get it differently.

    BB plans are cheaper everywhere else than the U.S it seems.
    BES also costs more money than a flat (tiered or not) data rate from most carriers so it does actually make sense to switch. I don’t think Dell did it for publicity.

    I’m guessing support costs would go down as well, since IT folk would be responsible (exchange server vs. dealing with RIM over BES). Security-wise, windows phone 7 devices are able to be remotely wiped. Android devices, depending on the manufacturer also have a remote wipe feature, which means it’s able to be done, all it takes is a software feature.

    This isn’t a big deal in the big picture for RIM. Dell’s but one partner..erm, ex-partner? It’s a slap in the face though.

  • dmallor

    I wonder if RIM said the same thing when Android came out. They sure are hard headed yet still are always behind on features. If my company supported active sync or something else I would ditch my blackberry as quick as I could order a droid.

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