Blackberry

BlackBerry launches its first new smartphone, the Z10, in the U.S. on Friday, a major test of whether the once-dominant cellphone maker can mount a comeback. Analysts say this could be the company's last chance to reverse its flagging fortunes — though even the company itself says it's merely looking for a strong third place finish for this launch, behind phones running Google's Android operating system and Apple's iPhone. And the Z10 is a capable phone — sleek, smooth and stylish.

BlackBerry, with an eye on making a bigger footprint in the mobile space, announced that its popular messaging system, BlackBerry Messenger, will soon be available on competitors' platforms. BlackBerry Messenger, or BBM, will be coming to phones that support Apple's iOS 6 platform and Android's Ice Cream Sandwich . BlackBerry chief executive Thorsten Heins said that the BBM apps for those platforms will come this summer and will be available for free. The company made the announcement Monday at a...

As Research in Motion prepares for an important update to its Blackberry phone, it's focusing on the needs of some of its most important customers: government workers. Research in Motion currently has 1 million security-conscious government customers in North America, but Apple's iPhones and phones running Google's Android operating system are now common place on Capitol Hill. The same is true at the State Department, NASA, Department of Veteran Affairs and the Department of Homeland Security.

ORLANDO, Fla. — Research In Motion unveiled a lower-cost BlackBerry aimed at consumers in emerging markets on Tuesday, stepping up its efforts to regain market share lost to Apple's iPhone and Android devices powered by Google's software. The lower-cost gadget, called the Q5, is the company's third smartphone to run the new BlackBerry 10 system. It will have a physical keyboard, something that sets RIM's devices apart from Apple's iPhone and most Android phones. RIM CEO Thorsten Heins said the "slim, sleek"...

When Great Country Farms sets out to celebrate blackberries, it goes all out. The lineup for this weekend's festival is insanely jampacked. Visitors can take a hayride out to the fields to pick blackberries, taste blackberry wine, slurp blackberry ice cream and learn about the farm's organic gardening techniques. There'll also be yoga and pottery demonstrations, a bug-collecting contest and live music. Kids can get lost in four mazes, zoom down slides, jump on an inflatable pillow, play putt-putt, ride on pedal tractors and soar on rope swings.

Remember when we were the BlackBerry Nation? When we couldn't bear to be apart from our Crackberries? A few months ago? In one short summer, the fickle nation has wheeled on its heels and cold-heartedly dumped the 'Berry , and now bats its eyelashes at the new boys in town. A year ago, nearly 40 percent of all smartphone users owned devices from BlackBerry maker RIM, according to the market research firm comScore. This summer, RIM's share of the market fell to less than 20 percent, while Google's rose from 17 to more than 40 percent...

As the doors closed on the Metrorail train he was riding home from work yesterday, ABC News senior political reporter Rick Klein reached for his BlackBerry to encounter his worst nightmare: no new e-mails. Earlier, Klein had been getting hundreds of e-mails an hour for his political blog "The Note" in preparation for today's Potomac Primary. But like millions of BlackBerry users across the country, he was caught up in an afternoon blackout that lasted for more than three hours. For Klein, being cut off from e-mail, even...

Truphone , the VoIP-calls over mobile software developer made most famous by its iPhone app, now has a beta version of the app running on the BlackBerry 8801 and Curve devices. The product is called Truphone Anywhere for Blackberry. London-based Truphone, which can use Wi-Fi as well as phone network for VoIP calls, started out on Symbian OS-based Nokia devices but really started to hit paydirt when it launched an iPhone app. There is no Windows Mobile version right now but one is understood to be in development.

Research in Motion, maker of the BlackBerry smartphone, forecast second-quarter revenue and profit that missed analysts' estimates and said it will cut jobs as a lack of new models prompts consumers to buy rival devices. The stock fell as much as 16 percent in late trading after RIM said profit this quarter would be 75 cents to $1.05 a share. Analysts predicted $1.40, excluding some costs, according to a Bloomberg survey. Revenue will be $4.2 billion to $4.8 billion in the three months through August, RIM said, compared with the...

BlackBerry, the new name of the Canadian phone manufacturer Research in Motion, surprised analysts and investors Thursday by announcing that it turned a profit last quarter. From the Associated Press : The earnings provide a first glimpse of how RIM's new touch-screen BlackBerry Z10 is selling internationally and in Canada since its debut Jan. 31. The 1 million Z10 phones were above the 915,000 that analysts had been expecting . . . In the quarter that ended March 2, RIM earned $98...

TORONTO — The CEO of BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion will deliver a keynote speech amid speculation that he'll introduce a lower-priced version of the BlackBerry at the company's annual three-day conference in Orlando, Fla. CEO Thorsten Heins is set to speak Tuesday morning. RIM unveiled new, versatile BlackBerrys earlier this year after delays allowed Apple and others to dominate the smartphone market. The BlackBerry, pioneered in 1999, had been the dominant smartphone for on-the-go business...

Forget the death of the PC: BlackBerry chief executive Thorsten Heins thinks tablets are on their way out as users shift to doing more through their smartphones. In comments Monday at a Milken Institute conference, Heins said smartphones will become users' main source of computing power in the next five years. People will simply plug whatever display, keyboard or other accessory they need to do their work into a smartphone. For many workers, a smartphone will be the only device they need, he said.

Two of the most-watched names in the smartphone business, Samsung and BlackBerry, are upping their game with new models this spring — but neither offers a game-changer. Both Samsung's Galaxy S4 and BlackBerry's Q10 are strong upgrades that should please their fans, but neither device offers a killer feature that shifts the paradigm of the highly competitive market. That's less of a problem for market leader Samsung than for BlackBerry, which is trying to claw back into contention with a line of new...

BlackBerry's Q10 is a phone that knows who its customers are. The phone looks very familiar, sporting a full QWERTY keyboard and a squarish 3.1-inch screen in the classic BlackBerry style. Simply put, the Q10 is best for those still addicted to their "CrackBerrys," having ignored the siren song of iPhones and Androids in favor of a physical keyboard. If you're not a BlackBerry fan, then the Q10 is going to be a hard sell for you. It's pretty tough to ignore that its screen, for example, is dwarfed...

Jobseekers using their smartphones to look for work are likely to find frustration instead. Recent studies have shown that many large employers have not adapted their job application Web sites for smartphones and tablets, a decision that analysts say could put them at a disadvantage for landing new staffers as an increasing volume of Web traffic comes from mobile devices . The lack of a mobile-friendly job-application process may be especially...

BlackBerry lashed out at an analyst Friday and called on federal regulators to investigate his "false and misleading" assertions that customers were returning the company's latest smartphones to stores in unusually high numbers. The Canadian firm challenged the research of an analyst at Detwiler Fenton, who wrote that customers were complaining about the "unintuitive nature" of the Z10 smartphones and giving them back to the point where "returns are now exceeding sales" in some...

BlackBerry has been upbeat about sales of its new smartphones, saying that sales in Canada and Great Britain — two strong markets for the company — have been going great. Chief Executive Thorsten Heins said that this week's launch in Canada was the "best day ever" for a new BlackBerry smartphone, though the company didn't provide any specific numbers. Heins also said that sales in Britain have nearly tripled the company's best debut week smartphone sales — again, without specifics.

So, we've known for a while that U2's latest world tour was going to be sponsored by RIM , makers of the BlackBerry. And we've known that this was slightly odd because U2 lead singer Bono is a founder of Elevation Partners (which, yes, was named after a U2 song). The same Elevation Partners that owns a huge stake in Palm, makers of the Pre. But good for Bono, apparently not mixing work and, well, other work. But perhaps even odder is the BlackBerry commercial now in circulation.

BlackBerry said Friday that it will ask the Securities and Exchange Commission and Canadian officials to review reports that the company is seeing high customer return rates for its latest smartphone. In a release, the company specifically mentioned a report by an analyst at Detwiler Fenton, who said that returns of the company's new Z10 smartphone were unusually high and had, in some cases, exceeded sales numbers. BlackBerry shares fell as much as 8 percent in Thursday trading after the reports...

BlackBerry, the new name of the Canadian phone manufacturer Research in Motion, surprised analysts and investors Thursday by announcing that it turned a profit last quarter. From the Associated Press : The earnings provide a first glimpse of how RIM's new touch-screen BlackBerry Z10 is selling internationally and in Canada since its debut Jan. 31. The 1 million Z10 phones were above the 915,000 that analysts had been expecting . . . In the quarter that ended March 2, RIM earned $98...