Maker of the BlackBerry smartphone, Research in Motion should see Africa as a market that can play a key role in its plans for continued investment and growth in the smartphone business.There is no doubt that Africa is a market where you have a great mix of enterprise,small and medium enterprise and growing consumers.The continent is a fast becoming a commercial hub with a healthy appetite for high-tech commercial solutions.RIM enjoyed a year-on-year growth of 27% in Africa, according to IDC's Africa Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker 2Q 2011 survey.Overall,smartphone shipments grew by 65% year-on-year.BlackBerrys have carved a niche for themselves in Africa like no other smartphone brands and with their longstanding heritage in quality physical QWERTY keypads and being synonymous with enterprise mobility the brand has a bright future in the continent.
In my own opinion it will provide an advantage for users, specifically those who are active with social media sites like Facebook and Twitter and short messaging well known as BlackBerry Messenger services.Clearly,I can already see competing brands coming out with their own respective QWERTY models, on top of their full touchscreen products.He told me that RIM's BlackBerry Academic Programme may be set up in two Africa countries by mid next year with prominent Universities acting as the participating institutions. The programme will provide colleges and universities with a curriculum to offer courses in administering, supporting and developing apps for the BlackBerry platform.
For many like me, it's not really that surprising if you've been following recent news about its BlackBerrys.There is no doubt RIM has been having a nightmare of a year because the company is experiencing declining global market share and BlackBerrys are struggling to compete against more popular Apple's iPhone 4S and Android-based smartphones from rivals such as Sony Ericsson,LG,HTC and Samsung.In a recent report,BlackBerry's market share declined sharply worldwide in the third quarter of this year. It said RIM's smartphone market share dropped from 15% globally in third quarter of last year to 10% in the third quarter of this year.For example the shipments of RIM smartphones fell from12.4 million to 11.8 million during the same period.
Even within the enterprise segment where RIM has long held dominance,a recent report in my possession has predicted that the company's hold will diminish in every continent except Africa over the next five years as there will be more stiff competition from Windows Phone platform.The report forecasts that market share of BlackBerry devices in the corporate arena will remain stagnant at 25% from 2011 to 2016. Despite the bleak future outlook elsewhere,Africa remains the main hope for BlackBerry where it will remain the overall leader for the forecast period as its strong device management and security capabilities make it a favourite with IT departments.However, reflecting trends in the consumer smartphone market,Windows Phone and other OS devices will make significant gains especially Android powered phones.
For example in East Africa,the Android phones now accounts for more than 20% of all smartphones available and the growth is expected to continue.In Kenya,more than 400,000 Android phones were sold while in Uganda over 100,000 and in Tanzania there are over 50,000 in a period of 10 months ending 30th October this year.In West African countries,over 1,000,000 android phones were sold for the first six months while in Southern Africa countries over 2,000,000 were sold in the same period.If Blackberry ongoing improvements in manageability of its platform and support for more business applications,they will continues to make these devices much more appealing to enterprise buyers than largely insecure but increasingly popular Android devices.
This is why over 3,000,000 new business popping up in African provide an ideal market for RIM than other platforms.RIM has to ensure that the e-mail, messaging, and web service that went down across the world, starting in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and eventually spreading to the United States and Canada should be happen again.In my own research and data collected from various mobile companies in West,East and Southern African countries there is evidence that Blackberry is the most sought after smartphone and that is why RIM should channel its efforts to the World fastest mobile market.
The BlackBerry is very popular in that continent and there are more than 5 million Blackberry users in Africa. This accounts for 10% of the BlackBerry global user base of 50 million.I also strongly believe Blackberry will continue to attract young users to its products primarily because of the immense popularity of its BlackBerry Messenger instant-messenger service.According to information that I have gathered,BBM is still growing in terms of user base with about two million new users a month getting on the chat platform where Africa accounts for 20%.That is no mean achievement for Canadian company because that translates to about 48 new users every second and about 70% of them are active daily users.
RIM should also be turning more to this part of the world when it comes to its BlackBerry developer community. Their focus should be very much on Africa in many respects because it's a dynamo of growing economies, people who are increasingly getting sophisticated in application development and socially collaborative, it fits perfectly with the value proposition Blackberry has to offer.I do also think that Africa region with its booming middle-class segment is an enviable market for any smartphone manufacturer.
In my own opinion it will provide an advantage for users, specifically those who are active with social media sites like Facebook and Twitter and short messaging well known as BlackBerry Messenger services.Clearly,I can already see competing brands coming out with their own respective QWERTY models, on top of their full touchscreen products.He told me that RIM's BlackBerry Academic Programme may be set up in two Africa countries by mid next year with prominent Universities acting as the participating institutions. The programme will provide colleges and universities with a curriculum to offer courses in administering, supporting and developing apps for the BlackBerry platform.
For many like me, it's not really that surprising if you've been following recent news about its BlackBerrys.There is no doubt RIM has been having a nightmare of a year because the company is experiencing declining global market share and BlackBerrys are struggling to compete against more popular Apple's iPhone 4S and Android-based smartphones from rivals such as Sony Ericsson,LG,HTC and Samsung.In a recent report,BlackBerry's market share declined sharply worldwide in the third quarter of this year. It said RIM's smartphone market share dropped from 15% globally in third quarter of last year to 10% in the third quarter of this year.For example the shipments of RIM smartphones fell from12.4 million to 11.8 million during the same period.
Even within the enterprise segment where RIM has long held dominance,a recent report in my possession has predicted that the company's hold will diminish in every continent except Africa over the next five years as there will be more stiff competition from Windows Phone platform.The report forecasts that market share of BlackBerry devices in the corporate arena will remain stagnant at 25% from 2011 to 2016. Despite the bleak future outlook elsewhere,Africa remains the main hope for BlackBerry where it will remain the overall leader for the forecast period as its strong device management and security capabilities make it a favourite with IT departments.However, reflecting trends in the consumer smartphone market,Windows Phone and other OS devices will make significant gains especially Android powered phones.
For example in East Africa,the Android phones now accounts for more than 20% of all smartphones available and the growth is expected to continue.In Kenya,more than 400,000 Android phones were sold while in Uganda over 100,000 and in Tanzania there are over 50,000 in a period of 10 months ending 30th October this year.In West African countries,over 1,000,000 android phones were sold for the first six months while in Southern Africa countries over 2,000,000 were sold in the same period.If Blackberry ongoing improvements in manageability of its platform and support for more business applications,they will continues to make these devices much more appealing to enterprise buyers than largely insecure but increasingly popular Android devices.
This is why over 3,000,000 new business popping up in African provide an ideal market for RIM than other platforms.RIM has to ensure that the e-mail, messaging, and web service that went down across the world, starting in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and eventually spreading to the United States and Canada should be happen again.In my own research and data collected from various mobile companies in West,East and Southern African countries there is evidence that Blackberry is the most sought after smartphone and that is why RIM should channel its efforts to the World fastest mobile market.
The BlackBerry is very popular in that continent and there are more than 5 million Blackberry users in Africa. This accounts for 10% of the BlackBerry global user base of 50 million.I also strongly believe Blackberry will continue to attract young users to its products primarily because of the immense popularity of its BlackBerry Messenger instant-messenger service.According to information that I have gathered,BBM is still growing in terms of user base with about two million new users a month getting on the chat platform where Africa accounts for 20%.That is no mean achievement for Canadian company because that translates to about 48 new users every second and about 70% of them are active daily users.
RIM should also be turning more to this part of the world when it comes to its BlackBerry developer community. Their focus should be very much on Africa in many respects because it's a dynamo of growing economies, people who are increasingly getting sophisticated in application development and socially collaborative, it fits perfectly with the value proposition Blackberry has to offer.I do also think that Africa region with its booming middle-class segment is an enviable market for any smartphone manufacturer.
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