After reporting a miserable third quarter showing losses of $4.4 billion and 56 percent in revenue decline, BlackBerry managed to give the latest news on BBM traction. BlackBerry announced that its messenger app has gotten over 40 million “newly registered iOS/Android users in the last 60 days.” The company failed to decipher what the total number of active users are compared to those just registered.
Messaging: Over 40 million newly registered iOS/Android users in the last 60 days; more than a dozen Android OEMs to preload BBM, including most recently LG; over 250,000 BBM Channels created by global user base since launch of BBM Channels on BlackBerry, including large brands such as Coke Indonesia and USA Today; BBM is the most secure mobile messaging service for use in regulated enterprises.
Although these are good numbers for BlackBerry, they’re still peanuts compared to the whopping numbers competitor WhatsApp dropped on us the other day. WhatsApp reported that it had gained 100 million users in just four months, bringing its total active users up to an impressive 400 million. As you can see, BlackBerry has its work cut out for itself when trying to stack up against the messaging giant that is WhatsApp.
The only hope BlackBerry has to put a dent in that 400 million users is to make BBM a differentiator — which at the moment, is not. Getting LG to commit to pre-installing BBM on its future handsets is just one step to many more it has to do to stay relevant.
[CrackBerry; via 9to5Google]