With the invention of the first smartphone, Blackberry wrote technology history. But the Canadian company missed some trends and was or is counted. The turnaround should be achieved with the new CEO John Chen.
The era of mobile email began with the Blackberry 850.
If you were self-conscious, you had a Blackberry in your
pocket or, even better, always in your hand. In 1999 the "Blackberry
850" heralded the era of mobile communication. The handy, wireless device
enabled its users to call up e-mails and coordinate contacts and appointments
while on the move. Even a rudimentary HTML browser was integrated.
From today's perspective, the devices supplied with a black
and white display may seem quite antiquated, but the Blackberry has long been a
status symbol and the favorite gadget of managers and starlets. The successor
model "Blackberry 5810" with an integrated mobile phone, presented in
2002, was the first smartphone and marks a milestone in the history of
technology.
The Blackberry 5810
is considered to be the first smartphone in the history of technology
The clever mind behind Blackberry is Mihalis
"Mike" Lazaridis. Born in 1961 in Istanbul to Greek parents, the
family emigrated to Canada with the five-year-old. Even as a young boy he liked
to work on radios and was interested in physics. In 1979 Lazaridis began
studying electrical engineering and computer science at the University of Waterloo.
In 1984, just two months before graduation, he dropped out
of college to set up his own company, Research In Motion Limited, or RIM for
short . He is in good company, because IT founders such as Bill Gates or
Michael Dell dropped out of their studies and preferred to get rich without an
academic degree.
Email addiction with the crackberry
RIM has dealt with new communication technologies from the
beginning. Blackberry's smartphones were expensive, but quickly became a
"must have" for managers and stars. The devices were addictive, which
was reflected in nicknames like "Crackberry". The "Wall Street
Journal" worried in 2007 - probably not taken very seriously - about the
"Blackberry orphans" neglected by their smartphone-addicted parents.