The announcements by Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) that they were going after the business market with their iPhone demanded a response from Research In Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM), and they've done that with their new "Bold" model; the first new model from the company in a year.
Concerning the timing of the launch, most were happy with it, as it was expected to come much later in 2008 for the third-generation smartphone. A 3G phone refers basically to high-speed, advanced wireless services.
According to RIM, the new smartphone will include a screen resolution twice that of the "Curve" phone, and also offer dual-band Wi-Fi and GPS capabilities.
There will also be a media player you can watch movies with and manage your music collections, while also a 2-megapixel camera with the ability to record videos.
The "Bold" resolution will equal that offered by the Apple iPhone, but it won't have a screen as large as their competitor. Another feature that will be offered for the first time will be back plates in different colors that will be exchangable.
It'll stay pretty much the same as the "Curve," retaining the horizontal screen above a trackball, as well as keeping the keyboard the same with one letter per key.
RIM Co-CEO Jim Balsillie said "Bold" will cost between $300 and $400.
AT&T (NYSE:T) will be the sole network provider for the Bold model, as it's the only one in the U.S. that is compatible with it at this time. Later models could be offered with the Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE:S) and Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ) networks in the future.
While Balsillie says the new phone will be targeted toward their core business and government customers, that's pretty hard to believe to me. Why would it be? Even when Apple said it was going to offer new phones to business users, the response, overall, was Apple didn't understand the needs of business users and it didn't create a lot of interest from that sector.
I think the reason it's being spun that way is to keep investor concerns that it may be venturing too far outside its expertise, in check. This is an obvious move to expand its base beyond its core user. Even now over 33 percent of RIM's approximate 14 million users are considered noncorporate and nongovernment.
They pretty much know, even with a yawn toward the Apple assertion of competing in the business phone market, that they can never count Apple out entirely, and more than likely they'll get a piece of the action, even if it's a small percentage. That would definitely cut into their future growth.
So the "Bold" has been created to expand beyond their business base, although it could still definitely used as a business tool if needed. To say it's primarily built to compete in the business space is unconvincing. The added features are definitely consumer related, and built for that purpose.
To work alongside the release of the "Bold," the company said they're going to work together with Thomson Reuters (TRI.N) and Royal Bank of Canada (RY.TO) launch a venture capital fund for the purpose of investing in services and applications to use on the Blackberry and other mobile platforms.
Separately, the company also made a deal with Microsoft (MSFT) to provide Microsoft Windows Live services on Blackberry devices. It'll include email and instant messaging services, among others.
Apple is looking to release a 3G iPhone sometime this summer as well.
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