Canadian cell phone company, Blackberry has recently cut 4500 jobs in an attempt to jolt the company out of decline. Essentially Blackberry has accepted a $900 million dollar loss in the means of unsold phones and unused parts. Blackberry is basically providing the textbook example for a “sunk cost”. The companies downfall comes from the increased competition in the smartphone market and Blackberry’s inability to retain their professional/business consumer market. Blackberry’s stock dropped roughly 16% on the day after announcing their loss, which contributes to the company’s ugly 41.48% loss in the last 6 months alone.
I find it quite interesting how a company that was once regarded as the trailblazer in smartphone technology can now hardly stay afloat in comparison to the competition. It’s understandable that once something is made, soon enough there will be another company with a bigger better version, but it seems like Blackberry simply disregarded the idea of technological advances until the “woulda, coulda, should’ve” release of the Z10 and Q 10. It will be interesting to see if Blackberry can heal their injury, or if it will prove to be a career ender in a once upon a time Hall of Famer.
James Cowan pokes fun at the organizational and marketing skills in his blog post for MacLeans magazine. In my opinion as well, it is slightly astonishing how the once most powerful smartphone company can rapidly spiral to the bottom.
http://www2.macleans.ca/2013/10/10/we-respected-blackberry-but-we-never-loved-it/
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/trading-in-blackberry-halted/article14440386/
Image Source:http://money.cnn.com/quote/quote.html?symb=BBRY
