Research in Motion Ltd. (RIM) is making at attempt to surprise the world by attracting developers and applications who love their BlackBerry Smartphones. RIM is launching many new services and specialized development tools in the coming weeks that promise to make it much easier to code any software for the BlackBerry. The moves are part of the effort to win back customers opting for iPhones from Apple Inc. or mobile phones that run Google Inc.'s Android OS. Customer defections have impacted BlackBerry's commanding market share and fueling an investor unease that has pushed RIM shares down around 25% so far this year.
RIM's new tools and services aim to help developers. The software firm says that while RIM is very supportive, it is too hard to make money on its call-logging application, which it sells exclusively through BlackBerry's App World store. Customers can download a free version of Widality's program, but if they like the tool and want to purchase the premium version, which has added features, they have to first uninstall the free program, download the premium version from a website, reload their data, and pay through a PayPal account a complicated, time-consuming process that few people make it through. RIM's head of application development, says the company has worked the past two years to make Blackberry’s more developer-friendly. But RIM has its work cut out winning over developers who are new to Blackberry’s or who have written them off as too tough and time consuming to create software for.
PopCap developed games for Blackberry's as recently as a few years ago. But during the last year the firm has largely switched focus to iPhones and phones running Android because of their growing popularity and slick, powerful systems. Even with RIM's recent efforts, there are too many Blackberry's around whose operating systems and processors are too old and slow to make it worthwhile to spend scarce team time on them. Calgary, Alberta-based Widality which last month was bought by mobile-services firm Wmode Inc.—is hoping that new payment options RIM is planning to launch in the next few months will finally let it make decent money on its call-logging app, which tracks how much time was spent on calls and assigns it to clients or projects for billing at appropriate rates—features that have made it popular with lawyers and consultants. Widality used to charge $2.99 for the app until recently the minimum fee at the BlackBerry App World store—but found users wanted to try the software before they bought it. The firm switched to a free app with limited functions, but getting customers to switch to the premium app was tough.
The new options will let developers charge a subscription fee or let users buy extra features from inside the app—things the iPhone has long allowed. Widality is planning to ask users for a dollar or two each time they download a spreadsheet with logged calls, or $8 a month for unlimited downloads. A developer in U.K. says he's interested in a new advertising service RIM launched late last month. The service automatically matches apps with ads served from several big mobile-advertising networks. That's perfect for Maxbridge, which is just starting to experiment with apps for the consumer market—like one that lets users search train times and schedules. We want to put ads in, but we don't have an ad department, says Mr. Strange. The whole idea of trying to drive advertising to a free application was really scary to a small company that didn't have any contacts with ad partners. Mr. Strange is also planning to use a free analytics service RIM has slated for early next year, which helps developers understand who is using their apps and how. That's handy for the train-schedule app, since Mr. Strange recently added a feature that lets users search for the nearest station to a postal code—but he's not sure anybody needs or uses it.
RIM directed a free-lance developer California, to develop a new software package that would let him use common tools for building Web applications to create BlackBerry apps as well. Mr. Sanchez had written an app that supplies men with pick-up lines and hints. He'd adapted the app for iPhones and Nokia Corp. phones, as well as devices running Android and Palm operating systems, but couldn't get it working on Blackberry's. Mr. Sanchez says he has high hopes for the new software.
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