BlackBerry is in the process of transforming itself in India as well as globally, shifting its focus from handsets to enterprise mobility management solutions built on BlackBerry’s security platform, the Company’s USP. Annie Mathew, director, alliances and business development, BlackBerry India, talks to tele.net about the company’s performance as well as future growth strategies. Excerpts…
How has the Indian handset ecosystem evolved in the past few years? What are the emerging trends in this space?
The smartphone market is one of the most dynamic sectors in the world. Smartphone usage is growing quarter on quarter on account of growth in mobile applications as well as improved hardware. Also, there is a huge demand for devices that offer an array of features to consumers and help them to stay productive on the go. With the rise in affordable internet connectivity and growing smartphone penetration, the consumption of content on smartphones has also increased. Some of the major trends in the Indian handset ecosystem are:
One of the key trends in the market is the emergence of devices that are suited for both professional and personal use. A lot of employees are bringing their devices to work. The IT leads in turn need to manage these devices effectively to ensure flexibility as well as security.
How different is the Indian market from other markets that BlackBerry caters to globally? What are the company’s key focus areas in the Indian market?
India is a priority market for BlackBerry. We are seeing a great opportunity to grow our presence in India as the enterprise market here increasingly adopts mobility as a vital part of doing business. With the Indian government increasing its focus on Smart Cities and Digital India, there is a huge opportunity for the Internet of Things (IoT), given the country’s growing population and fast-growing internet penetration. BlackBerry’s QNX embedded solution creates the building blocks for the company to deliver machine-to-machine (M2M) technologies that will act as the backbone for the emerging era of IoT.
India is witnessing a surge in smartphones at the workplace. Most of these devices are individually owned and are brought to the workspace to access corporate data. Further, there has been an increase in malware, spyware and other forms of cyberattacks, many of which are a result of malicious applications unknowingly downloaded on employees’ personal devices. Naturally, large enterprises as well as small medium enterprises, particularly in regulated sectors like BFSI, IT services, manufacturing, legal, FMCG, pharmaceuticals, hospitality and retail, are concerned about the loss of sensitive corporate data on individually owned devices.
BlackBerry’s BES12 simplifies the task of mobilising an organisation by providing a single command and control centre for managing the availability and usage of devices, applications, activities and mission-critical data. We have seen a surge in the number of BES12 on premises server installations over the past few months. In fact, customers are showing significant interest in our BES12 Cloud offering. Cloud can be an ideal solution for companies that want to provide employees easy access to work information on their personal devices or company-provided mobile devices without the fuss and expense of an on-premises solution.
How has BlackBerry’s business in India performed over the past two to three years?
BlackBerry’s revenue constitutes services, software and devices. Over the past two years, our focus has been on driving profitable growth through an optimal mix of these three business segments. This strategy is paying off in India with a tremendous response to our enterprise offerings. For us, the benchmark is profitability and consumer base and our strategy, going forward, would be to focus on software and services as they offer better margins. BlackBerry will continue to thrive in India because our strategy is well aligned with the country’s market needs. We see great opportunities ahead of us as we continue to make significant headway on our plan to return BlackBerry to growth and profitability in India and globally.
What are the key challenges faced by BlackBerry while operating in India?
There are no challenges as such. India is a huge market and provides ample opportunities for us to grow and thrive.
How do you plan to revive your position in the Indian handset market?
BlackBerry has a legacy and, being one of the pioneers in smartphone innovation, the brand continues to resonate with consumers as one of the most trusted smartphone makers. In this regard, India remains an extremely important country for us. We have redefined our strategy and structured the business into four pillars: enterprise services, messaging, QNX embedded business and the devices business. This restructuring was devised to achieve greater focus on services and software while establishing a more efficient business model for the devices business.
What is the way forward for BlackBerry’s operations in India? At a global level, what steps are being taken by the company to revive its position and profitability?
We have witnessed a successful uptake of our four pillar strategy, which revolves around laying emphasis on enterprise software and the services business, and driving down costs. This has helped the company offer more affordable devices including the BlackBerry Classic and the BlackBerry Leap. These devices were targeted at professionals who are looking to increase productivity while on the go.
Further, our multi-tenant cloud version of BES12 gives us even more opportunities to win customers and helps us retain our market-leading position. The cloud service minimises the complexity of managing a fleet of disparate mobile devices, it is beneficial for IT departments that are strained in today’s business environment and essential for teams or businesses without an IT department.
BlackBerry has recently announced partnerships, enterprise solutions and value-added services that will further improve productivity, communication and collaboration for enterprises and expand the company’s enterprise portfolio spanning enterprise mobility management (EMM), identity and access, and communications and collaboration. BES12, a cross-platform EMM solution by BlackBerry, serves as the company’s foundation to control access, data and applications across all mission-critical endpoints and devices, supporting all major enterprise platforms. As a part of the company’s strategy, we will continue to expand our solutions and services to enable customers to tap the full potential of enterprise mobility with new initiatives and acquisitions.
Our recent enterprise solutions and service announcements include:
What is your outlook for data service uptake in India in the near future? How is this likely to benefit BlackBerry?
The proliferation of smartphones and increasing consumption of content on devices are the key drivers for data growth. With the launch of 3G and 4G services in India, it is expected that data services will grow fourfold.
What are your views on the prevailing regulatory environment in the Indian telecom sector?
With the current favourable regulatory policies and 4G services hitting the market, we expect a rapid growth in the Indian telecom sector in the coming years. IoT, M2M technologies and the connected world will lead to the next phase of growth in the telecom sector. Security and analytics will emerge as key priority areas with the new developments.