科技前沿:黑莓背水一戰,放棄最後的優勢

Blackberry's decision to make its free messaging service, BBM, available on other mobile phone platforms is a Hail Mary play for a damaged company that pretty much has nothing to lose at this point. By giving away the stickiest feature available to Blackberry's dwindling consumer base to Android and iOS users for free, the company is hoping that it will be able to expand, or at the very least maintain, its once lucrative ecosystem.

黑莓（Blackberry）決定在其他手機平臺上提供其免費短信服務BBM，對於一家已經沒有什麼可以失去的公司來說，此舉是其背水一戰的“絕望之舉”。BBM是在黑莓日益減少的用戶羣體中用戶粘性最高的功能。公司希望通過將該功能免費提供給安卓（Android）和iOS用戶，擴大或至少維持一度利潤豐厚的生態系統。

It is extremely easy to bash on Blackberry (BBRY) these days. The bunglings of its former management team over the last five years will probably be studied in business schools for generations as how not to do just about everything. But Blackberry is on an upswing of sorts at the moment. Its stock has more than doubled from its lows hit last year, and after two years of development (light years in the tech world) the company is "back in the game" with the launch of its new operating system, Blackberry 10, and a few new handsets, the Z10, Q10, and the recently announced Q5.

如今，指摘黑莓非常容易。過去五年，公司前一個管理團隊的拙劣表現，或許將成爲商學院課堂上的經典負面教材，被一屆又一屆的學生們用來研究一家公司在面臨競爭時是如何坐以待斃的。但無論如何，現在的黑莓正處於上升期。公司股票比去年的最低點上漲了超過一倍，而且，經過兩年的發展（在科技界已經是很長時間）後，公司憑藉最新推出的操作系統 Blackberry 10以及Z10、Q10和最近發佈的Q5等幾款新手機，終於重回正軌。

Yet despite the recent optimism over the launch of the Blackberry 10 series, the company will almost certainly continue to lose market share in the crowded consumer hardware space to rivals that use Google's (GOOG) Android platform. Phones shipped with the Blackberry operating system made up just 2.9% of mobile phones sold in the first quarter of this year, down 35% from last year, according to new sale numbers released by IDC on Thursday. Phones running Microsoft's (MSFT) Windows operating system outsold Blackberry for what appears to be the first time, capturing 3.2% of the market. But phones running either Android or Apple's (AAPL) iOS, captured 92% of all mobile sales -- with Android garnering 59% of the total market, an 80% increase from the same time last year. With that, Android now runs on 75% of the world's smartphones.

然而，儘管Blackberry 10系列的發佈在近期引發了一些樂觀情緒，但在競爭激烈的消費類硬件領域，公司的市場份額仍在被使用谷歌（Google）安卓平臺的競爭對手不斷蠶食。據IDC週四公佈的最新銷售數據顯示，今年第一季度，搭載黑莓操作系統的手機出貨量僅佔市場份額的2.9%，比去年減少了35%。運行微軟Windows操作系統的手機首次超越黑莓，市場份額達到3.2%。而安卓與蘋果（Apple）iOS則聯手拿下了92%的市場份額，其中安卓的市場份額達到59%，比去年同期增長了80%。全球智能手機中，運行安卓系統的比例佔75%。

To be fair, those first-quarter sales numbers just reflect eight days of sales for the new Blackberry phones in the U.S. and just a couple of months of sales in Canada. Nevertheless, the public's lukewarm reception to the product -- no one was camping out for the new Z10 -- isn't encouraging. The phone has reportedly passed the 1 million shipped mark in its first quarter of launch, which isn't bad, but isn't great for a company with such huge brand recognition. By contrast, nearly 5 million iPhones were sold in the first week of its launch back in September.

公平地說，第一季度的銷售數據僅反映了新黑莓手機在美國八天的銷量和在加拿大兩個月的銷量。但消費者對於黑莓產品的冷淡反應令人沮喪。比如沒有任何人徹夜排隊購買新Z1O。據報道，Z10手機在發佈一個季度後，出貨量終於突破了100萬臺，這算不錯的表現，但對於一家擁有如此巨大的品牌認知度的公司而言，這並不值得慶賀。相反，去年九月，iPhone手機在發佈後僅僅一週時間內的銷量便接近500萬臺。

There really isn't much you can do on a Blackberry that you can't do on an Android phone these days. There aren't a bunch of must-have apps that run exclusively on Blackberry, for example. Indeed, Blackberry seems to have surrendered the app development space to Google as it considers the new Blackberry 10's ability to run Android app clones as a major selling point.

如今，黑莓手機能做的，在安卓手機上都能實現。沒有多少必備應用是僅在黑莓手機上運行的。實際上，黑莓似乎把應用開發空間拱手送給了谷歌，甚至它把Blackberry 10能夠運行安卓應用作爲一個重大的賣點。

But there is one consumer-focused feature that Blackberry offers that no other handset maker or mobile platform has -- its Blackberry Messaging Service (BBM). The service allows Blackberry users to send and receive messages, share files, and even exchange music with other Blackberry users without incurring special messaging charges from their wireless carrier. It has proven to be very sticky in places like Indonesia, Haiti, and Nigeria where wireless service is unreliable.

不過，黑莓有一個消費者導向的功能，是其他設備製造商或移動平臺無法提供的——黑莓信息服務（BBM）。該服務允許黑莓用戶之間發送和接收信息，共享軟件，甚至交換音樂，而無線運營商不會對此收費。事實證明，在印尼、海地和尼日利亞等無線服務不太可靠的地區，該功能具有很高的用戶粘度。

So imagine the confusion when Blackberry announced this week it was opening up BBM to both iOS and Android users through a free app that will be made available this summer. It seems odd that Blackberry would give up its only truly sticky consumer-focused feature. Some in the geek media called it "surrender," while others saw it as a great move by the company to open itself up to the rest of the mobile community.

然而，本週黑莓卻宣佈，公司將在今年夏天以免費應用形式，將BBM向iOS和安卓用戶開放，此舉引發的混亂可想而知。黑莓竟然放棄其唯一一個真正有粘性的消費者導向功能，這似乎是非常奇怪的一個舉動。在極客媒體中，有人稱此舉等於“投降”，而也有人認爲，公司向其他移動社區開放，是非常有力的舉措。

The move seems more akin to a company spinning off one of its divisions than anything else. BBM, with its 60 million users, is arguably the most buoyant thing in Blackberry's sinking consumer mobile division. If it remained attached to the ship it would surely drown. But allowed to roam free, BBM could possibly survive as a separate entity -- a slim chance, but a chance nonetheless. Survive as what? If BBM attracts enough iOS and Android users it could eventually become a sweet advertising portal for the company -- launching Blackberry as a player in the mobile advertising market. It could also possibly morph into a premier messaging app for companies who want to monitor employee communications.

此舉更像是公司剝離了一個部門。BBM約有6,000萬用戶，在黑莓日漸衰退的消費者移動部門，BBM無疑最有前途。如果繼續與整個部門捆綁在一起，最終也難逃一同沉沒的命運。但如果讓其自由發展，BBM或許能夠以一個獨立實體的形式存活下來——雖然機會很小，但總算還有希望。以什麼樣的形式存活下來呢？如果BBM能吸引足夠多的iOS和安卓用戶，其將成爲公司非常可靠的廣告平臺——幫助黑莓進軍移動廣告市場。此外，其也可能成爲希望監督員工通信的公司首選的消息應用。

But in order for that to happen, Blackberry will need to overcome an already saturated messenger app market. Here, scale and location matter. Texting and data plan prices in the U.S. have dropped so low you will be hard pressed to find anyone using a messaging app just to save on domestic text messaging fees. That may not be the case in other countries, but there, people are already using messaging apps like WhatsApp, Viber, and Skype. BBM touts its ability to set up Group chats of up to 30 people, but WhatsApp can do that and so can GroupMe, which is all the rage on college campuses these days. Most of these third-party messaging apps on all mobile platforms so they are ahead of the game with hundreds of millions of users. Unlike BBM, these apps don't require clumsy "pin" numbers to talk with other people; rather they just sync up easily to your phone's contacts and seek out those who have already downloaded the app. Unless Blackberry introduces some amazing new features, it will be tough, if not impossible, to get people to switch to BBM.

要將這些期望變成現實，黑莓必須征服已經飽和的短信應用市場。在這一市場，規模與位置至關重要。美國短信與數據方案的價格大幅下降，現在已經很難找到有人會單純爲了節省國內短信費而去使用短信應用。雖然其他國家的情況可能與美國不同，但目前市場上已經有WhatsApp、Viber和Skyper等短信應用。BBM的賣點之一是能夠支持最多30人的羣組聊天，WhatsApp和GroupMe同樣能夠做到。GroupMe目前在大學校園非常流行。目前大多數第三方短信應用均支持所有手機平臺，因此它們已經積累了數以百萬計的用戶基礎，遙遙領先BBM。而且，這些應用並不需要像BBM一樣，必須有笨拙的識別碼才能聊天；用戶只需要將應用與手機聯繫人同步，找出已經下載應用的聯繫人便可以開始聊天。除非黑莓能推出其他更神奇的新功能，否則，其很難說服消費者轉而使用BBM。

Nevertheless, BBM does have a couple things going for it that other messaging apps don't. First it has scale in the third world, which is the fastest growing market for smartphones. Blackberry could leverage its scale to totally dominate the messaging space in certain key markets, such as in West Africa and Indonesia. Secondly, BBMs are sent through Blackberry's own proprietary global data network, which encrypts incoming and outgoing messages and is thus considered "safer" than messages sent through other data networks. Blackberry has confirmed to Fortunethat BBMs sent through the iOS and Android apps will travel through its servers and thus will have the same security perks as BBM messages sent between Blackberry users.

不過，BBM確實有幾項其他短信應用無法媲美的優勢。首先，BBM在第三世界有龐大的用戶基礎，而第三世界是智能手機增長最快的市場。黑莓可以利用其規模來佔領某個關鍵市場的短信應用領域，例如西非和印尼等。其次，BBM通過黑莓自有的專用全球數據網絡收發信息，該網絡對接收和發送的信息進行加密，因此被認爲比通過其他數據網絡發送的信息“更安全”。黑莓已向《財富》雜誌（Fortune）確認，通過iOS與安卓版BBM應用發送的信息也將經由其服務器發送，因此與黑莓用戶發送的BBM信息同樣安全。

It is unclear what the future holds for Blackberry, but the company clearly feels that the potential benefits gained from allowing BBM to grow outside its own platform make up for any potential loss in handset sales. That's a good bet because while Blackberry's flagship phone, the Z10, has received praise from some tech geeks, it is hardly the game-changing product the company needed if it wanted to become a major player in the consumer handset market again. But even if Blackberry folds up its front-facing consumer division, it will remain a player behind the scenes as companies and governments remain dependent on Blackberry servers to keep their data safe. So by letting BBM go, Blackberry's new management may be saving it from a sad and quiet death.

黑莓的未來並不明朗，但很明顯，公司認爲，允許BBM在其自有平臺之外發展可能帶來的好處，足以彌補硬件設備銷售的減少。這是一個很好的選擇，因爲雖然黑莓的旗艦手機Z10獲得了科技發燒友的好評，但對於希望重新成爲消費者手機市場主要力量之一的黑莓公司而言，Z10並不足以改變市場格局。但如果黑莓放棄競爭激烈的消費部門，依然可以隱居幕後，因爲公司和政府仍依賴黑莓服務器來保證數據安全。因此，黑莓新管理團隊開放BBM的目的，或許是爲了幫助它擺脫安靜死去的悲慘命運。