RIM to Offer BlackBerry Connectivity for Microsoft Windows Powered Mobile Devices

[Jason Dunn]

"Research In Motion (RIM) today announced plans to enable BlackBerry(TM) connectivity for mobile devices based on the Microsoft Windows Powered Pocket PC and Smartphone platforms. RIM will provide a solution to help mobile device manufacturers and mobile operators easily integrate BlackBerry email and data services into their Pocket PC and Smartphone products."<br /><br />The article continues with this quote that made me go "Hmm...":<br /><br />"RIM is committed to enhancing and extending the BlackBerry wireless platform with multi-device and multi-network support," said Jim Balsillie, Chairman and Co-CEO at Research In Motion. "We have worked closely with Microsoft for several years to ensure proper BlackBerry integration with Exchange and are pleased to now expand our relationship to provide BlackBerry connectivity to leading Smartphone and Pocket PC licensees such as HTC."<br /><br />Now let's ponder that for a second - HTC is a hardware manufacturer, so if RIM is talking to HTC, it must be about something on a hardware level. Are they going to put a pager into their hardware? RIM Blackberry device are pagers on steroids - they do their jobs very well, but they're based on an outdated technology that should be supplanted by GPRS and other wireless technologies...but only if all the pieces are in place on the back-end side of things (Exchange, etc.).<br /><br />I'm just speculating here, but if HTC slaps a pager receiver onto their ODM devices, what about the software side of things? Will Microsoft update their OS to include support for receiving short pager messages? Or is this just a bunch of PR smoke that is about software, and not hardware? What's your analysis of this?

[bdegroodt]

MS buys RIM for the patents and I'm one happy camper? Please!!!

[Rob Borek]

The newest RIM devices do support GPRS - so it's all software based (well, possibly some minor hardware modifications or radio stack modifications). You're thinking of the old Mobitex/DataTAC devices - which used a (pretty much) proprietary network to deliver e-mail.

[bdeli]

RIM Blackberry device are pagers on steroids - they do their jobs very well, but they're based on an outdated technology that should be supplanted by GPRS and other wireless technologies...but only if all the pieces are in place on the back-end side of things (Exchange, etc.).


The new RIM pagers work on GPRS/CDMA technology, but the new models work on their JAVA OS. I ditched the 6710 I got last November since the OS was way too slow and buggy for my tastes + the 8MB they only included sucked big time. Now they have just released a new model (6210) which seems to have double the memory as other new options.

As for Exchange - they have their server products which integrate themselves into Exchange or Lotus Notes already.

As for MS buying RIM...i do not think so. Rumor has it that maybe RIM will buy the Handspring unit.

[bdegroodt]

I don't know about not putting anything into MS buying RIM. It's not like they have a real clean track record of treating "partners" as partners for long.

"Either give up and sell to us or we gut you!" :twisted:

Must get the patents! The precious patents.

[Jason Dunn]

The newest RIM devices do support GPRS - so it's all software based (well, possibly some minor hardware modifications or radio stack modifications). You're thinking of the old Mobitex/DataTAC devices - which used a (pretty much) proprietary network to deliver e-mail.

Ah, ok - then this starts to make more sense...HTC might add a few chips into their ODM devices and then the Pocket PCs would have RIM abilities from the silicon up.

Now that I ponder this some more, this is a very smart move by RIM - they're trying to get away from selling just a the hardware + software and more into selling the concept and execution...

[Janak Parekh]

The newest RIM devices do support GPRS - so it's all software based (well, possibly some minor hardware modifications or radio stack modifications). You're thinking of the old Mobitex/DataTAC devices - which used a (pretty much) proprietary network to deliver e-mail.
Exactly. It's entirely possible RIM has done some very cool work to leverage GPRS yet keep power consumption down, which is the bane of Pocket PC Phones right now (that is, keeping the unit "awake" to check mail).

Now that I ponder this some more, this is a very smart move by RIM - they're trying to get away from selling just a the hardware + software and more into selling the concept and execution...
It's also their way out from the lawsuits they're under. :D

--janak

[chris234]

I'm not sure I'd consider pagers "outdated" for a while yet. If there is a carrier that has half the coverage of my Skytel pager I'd be amazed.

[Wuss912]

according to here http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,109838,00.asp
it looks like it will be a softwere app

[Terry]

The Blackberry rocks...we have a slew around the office...full-time e-mail (next to full-time), seldom has battery failures, and syncs right (unlike ActiveSync). I still don't have my iPaq fully working with e-mail and AT&T GPRS... :roll:

(and I don't use a Blackberry myself although I'm responsible for putting them out in the workforce)

[Jeff Rutledge]

according to here http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,109838,00.asp
it looks like it will be a softwere app

This would appear to be very good news. I love the ease of my Blackberry, but it's a boring device.

Now if the hardware that's running it has a thumb keyboard and a rocker switch, that will be one sweet device.

We also have a slew of Blackberry's in our organization. It's the only PDA we officially support (because we have a Blackberry Enterprise Server). Our senior management really likes them: small, simple to use, not too complicated. But some of the more technically savvy prefer their more technical PDA's (Palm's and PPC's). It would be great if we could simply add install their Blackberry app on their new PPC device and add them to the BES to give them this added functionality.

If it works out in reality half as well as I'm picturing it (which is never does :? ), things are looking good.

[bdegroodt]

I thought one of the advantages to the "old" RIM software that uses the Mobitex network was the ubiquity of the signal. It's my understanding that its much more available than GPRS/1X wireless networks. Am I wrong?