BlackBerry PlayBook sales revealed: 500,000 units in Q1

By on Jun 16, 2011 at 4:35 PM
Breaking June 16, 2011

RIM on Thursday finally shed some light on BlackBerry PlayBook sales to date. Shipments to sales channels totalled 500,000 units in the first quarter, in line with the high end of analyst expectations. Analyst expectations ranged from 200,000 to 500,000 units — earlier this morning, RBC Capital Markets Managing Director Mike Abramsky said his firm expected PlayBook shipments to total 450,000 to 500,000 units, with 200,000 in distribution channels and 250,000 to 300,000 having been sold to end users. RIM did not reveal how many tablets have been sold through to end users. To put RIM’s PlayBook shipments in perspective, Motorola shipped 250,000 XOOM tablets during its first two months of availability, and Samsung shipped over 1 million Galaxy Tab units in less than two months.

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  • Anonymous

    The Playbook is like the Lindsay Lohan of tablets.

    • Tony

      They’d both be fun to play with when drunk?

      • Anonymous

        HAH!!! good one. I’d luv to snap a batch off on either one of them whores.

    • Applesucksfatties

      And the iMaxipad is like the Kim Kardashian?  A big ass, over-hyped POS…..

      • LemonadeJoe

        Awwww, are you crying again?

    • http://twitter.com/King_Of_Caps Money Cartel

      exactyl!

  • Anonymous

    Wonder how many are actually sold at the retailer?  The locations I’ve asked about have been pretty luke warm when asked about demand.

    • http://twitter.com/King_Of_Caps Money Cartel

      Here in NC I havent seen one! I know ppl with Blackerrys & they have iPads

  • http://profiles.google.com/draymis David Ray

    all of which doesn’t mean sh** unless they give the actual sell through number.

    Selling 500,000 to the channel doesn’t mean jack if 495,000 are still in the channel and only 5,000 were sold to customers. 

    • Nope

      Doesn’t mean sh** to whom? RIM gets paid for 500,000 PlayBooks either way.

      • http://profiles.google.com/draymis David Ray

        Actually, no they don’t.  If Best Buy or AT&T are each sitting on 100,000 playbooks, those unsold units are going back to RIM, and RIM is going to have to issue credits for most if not all the cost of the unsold models.

      • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_GP2WYAHXS6CRUREISWBGPUSUGE Michael

        Depends on the buying system they used. Most carriers do not get billed for product until they actually sell the product. If it just sets on the shelf for x amount of time they will send them back to RIM. Not one dime in the transaction, other than shipping. And the producer/parent company pays those.

        If the buying system worked as David Ray mentioned where they pay for them up front and return the unsold units. at most RIM will be paying out between 90% and 100% of the charge back to the carriers.

      • Anonymous

        It’s called consignment inventory.  And yes, RIM could say they “shipped” without being too full of it but if they aren’t actually “sold” at the retailer in the next Qtr they will need to account for the inventory.

        Well, the accounting types can chime in…

        Pretty hard to hide in this age of accounting.

      • Charles Griggs

         Uhhm…..NO.  Whilst there is no way anybody can know……yet……whether these are true sell through or Channel Stuffing if its channel stuffing it nearly always ends in tears.  At best it solves problem for one quarter. After that the channels tend to be rather reluctant to fall for it a second time. 

        There is a possible upside to this.  The Playbook has a nice spec in some respects.  If the channels can’t sell them at a certain point they might slash the price and dump them on the market.  Result a nice high quality browsing device. If the price was right I’d buy one for that.

        But if they are selling them through which is quite possible I’ll have a long wait!!

      • Anonymous

        With UK’s O2 refusing their shipment it looks like it is going to be an uphill battle for RIM. 500,000 units shipped in Q1… How many returned in Q2?

      • Anonymous

        O2 does not want to sell a wifi device because they don’t make money from the service they provide, so while you sit there and spew nonsense the rest of the world understands the real reason why they are not picking a wifi only device.

      • Anonymous

        @SirhillDaDon:disqus 

        “so while you sit there and spew nonsense the rest of the world understands the real reason why they are not picking a wifi only device.”

        Perhaps you should read around before accusing me of “spewing nonsense”. The reason given by O2 was the “end to end customer experience”, Now that could be misconstrued I suppose to mean that O2 weren’t allowed to shove their skin / their apps on it, if you were being generous, but in truth – based on yesterday’s earnings. Rim. Are. Toast. Hate to break it to you.

      • http://twitter.com/King_Of_Caps Money Cartel

         Just because something is shipped doesnt mean its been sold – you can have over inventory of products & stuff can be shipped back to the manufacture

  • Anonymous

    I work with someone close to a large organization in Boston who recently purchased over 1,000 of these devices for use in corporate meetings etc…

    Within one week, they were all being returned.  So, while actual sales to consumers might could be as high as 200,000, I’m curious just how many of these things go back after said consumer has had it for a short period of time.

    • chicol1090

      A lot of people return these types of purchases. Something called buyers regret. It happens with every release, some people just realize they don’t want or need something shortly after they bought it.

      • Anonymous

        Yeah, but statistically it’s a low percentage, or should be a low percentage. You can quantify this and compare products. I wonder what the Playbook’s return rate is?

  • Anonymous

    It’s pretty easy to ship a large number or products. Harder to actually SELL said products.

    • Anonymous

      Damn right!!

      If its collecting dust on the shelf while iPads sells like hotcakes it pointless to use “shipped” numbers as a measure of “sales”. You can put lipstick on a pig and her name will still be Sarah Palin.

      • http://twitter.com/King_Of_Caps Money Cartel

         Apple clearly has this market on lock – Samsung had to copy the iPad design to compete & the iPad 3 comes out next year perhaps. I still say they need to buddle a Playbook w/ a Blackberry and sell them together as a package. The Playbook at the same price as an iPad the consumer is going to go for the iPad everytime!

  • Kingbernie06511

    good… I LOVE MY BRIDGE!!!!!

  • Clarence Johnson

    What is RIM doing wrong? And what is this QNX people keep raving about?

  • Will

    Difference with Galaxy Tab is that they are global numbers. RIM only just began releasing the PlayBook to the global market today.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_BN3LUVEV7BTS2NZOHAN3LV6DZE Chelsea Sampson

    I paid $32.67 for a XBOX 360 and my mom got a 17 inch Toshiba laptop for $94.83 being delivered to our house tomorrow by FedEX. I will never again pay expensive retail prices at stores. I even sold a 46 inch HDTV to my boss for $650 and it only cost me $52.78 to get. Here is the website we using to get all this stuff, BidsGet. com

    • Anonymous

      Thank you, I now know to never go to that site.

    • Steve Lee

      And how much did you get paid to post this BS here ? 

    • Carmen

      cunt

    • sirpaul

      Hey Chelsea, why don’t you go buy another 46 inch HDTV and shove it up your ass!

  • Guest

    while comparing the numbers it should be noted that april 19th (launch) to may 26th (quarter end) is not two months.

    • Uninvited Guest

      You must be a RIM’er.

  • Anonymous

    What i don’t understand is why when another company (Motorola) only gave how many they shipped and not sold it was fine but when RIM does it they get kicked in the nuts even more. Look they make money no matter how many was sold, they were shipped and paid. 

    • http://twitter.com/sct202 Scott

      RIM is getting the shaft because no one actually thinks that they sold anywhere near 500,000 Playbooks Heck Motorola only shipped half that number, and I doubt that the Playbook would outsell the Xoom. Shipped doesn’t equal paid especially with mobile devices.

      • chicol1090

        Not to mention that motorolas report was before they shipped wifi only models. With an android mobile device, I’d go android tablet. With a blackberry mobile device, I’d go blackberry tablet. With iPhone I’d go ipad.

  • http://twitter.com/King_Of_Caps Money Cartel

    They’ve shipped that many I wonder how many have they sold because I havent seen anyone with one – RIM has a huge problem with getting products out – by the time they get out theres something way better. And to the guy that says they work for RIM on here commenting & says everything is going to be okay you need to wake up. Android & Apple are kicking your butt RIM needs new leadership asap!

    • Anonymous

      Yup, and maybe Rim will start taking the advice of someone with the name “Money Cartel”……

  • Anonymous

    Ouch, Apple sold over 300,000 iPads on the first DAY and 1,000,000 iPads in 28 days.

  • Lisl

    this is where RIM didn’t think this through. 7 inch tablet with VERY similar specs as the iPad (save for the cameras) priced the same as the iPad.

    so when they release their rumoured 10 inch to appeal to consumers, what’s the pricing going to be like? It can’t possibly be the same as their 7 inch tablet, but yet it can’t be more expensive than the iPad or it’d go the way of the XOOM. decisions decisions decisions.

    i’ve played around with the playbook and it’s UI really does draw you in. really great product, well built, but the apps SUCK. They need the android player asap. browsing the web on the playbook is smooth and nice, but the smaller screen size limits the experience. RIM should have followed the ASUS Transformer and undercut the iPad by a 100 bucks. That bad boy is moving so many units it puts the playbook to shame.

  • max

    500k my ass.

    • Baby

      baby cryin’

  • http://twitter.com/RPimpsner Robert M. Pimpsner

    The Playbook is an awesome tablet.  I have noticed a double-standard of sorts on these tech sites when it comes between Blackberry, Android-powered tablets and the iPad.  Unlike the iPad, Blackberry and Android tablet manufacturers do not control the retail sales of their product so they are not able to give you exact sales numbers only what is shipped to retail outlets based on their demand.

    Oh and RIM is not dying.  Please learn business 101 and then comment.  RIM has lost marketshare in a market that is doubling in size due to cheaper smartphones being produced etc.  There is a difference between losing market share when a market size is stable then when a market size is doubling.  In addition 2011-2012 is a transition period for RIM as they are revamping their structure and product line.

    The fact that these numbres only represent the sales in North America and not internationally as with the oher tablets when they launched it is a good sign.

    Maybe it is because I use my electronics sparingly in public but I do not believe that devices “seen in the wild” is any indication of a product’s performance.  I live and work in New York City, I have seen iPad’s, iPad 2′s, Playbook’s and a few different android tablets.

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