BlackBerry isn't doing too badly, if you only pay attention to one of the company's products: BlackBerry Messenger. The BBM app finally became available for Android and iOS in the past week or so, and it's really taking off. According to BlackBerry, over 20 million new users have signed on.
As Latinos Post Tech previously reported, the release date for the BBM app for Android and iOS was initially set back by more than a week, after an unofficial Android version of BBM app hit the internet the day before launch, clogging up BBM's servers with inefficient data requests. The fact that the unofficial version of the Android BBM app garnered up to a million downloads before being taken down presaged the popularity of BBM.
Once BlackBerry was able to clear out the problem version and make the BBM app available for iOS and Android, that popularity became clear. According to BlackBerry's press release, within the first 24 hours of the BBM app's release for iPhone and Android, more than 10 million downloads of the app had occurred. It soon went to number one on Apple iTunes App Store free apps list.
According to BlackBerry's figures, BBM ended its first week of availability for the two most popular smartphone platforms with 80 million monthly active users - over 20 million of those being new users on Android smartphones and iPhones.
"It is great to see so many people downloading BBM, but the true measurement for us is engagement - the connections being made and the conversations in which our BBM community engages. The power of BBM has always been the active, real conversations and interaction that our customers enjoy," said Andrew Bocking, Executive Vice President of BBM at BlackBerry. "From here on out, we will focus on active users of BBM and will no longer focus on simple download numbers."
Meanwhile, BlackBerry, the larger company, has experienced an upheaval over the same few weeks while waiting for the official BlackBerry Messenger app to finally be released. After continuing poor sales of its BlackBerry devices like the BlackBerry Z10 and BlackBerry Q10, the company began looking for investors to take the company private. It seemed the re-launch of Research in Motion as BlackBerry, with the new devices and the new BlackBerry 10 operating system was not enough to turn the fortunes of the struggling smartphone maker.
BlackBerry Messenger continues to be a successful division of the larger BlackBerry Ltd., with some (unconfirmed) rumors of a spin-off BBM company even floating among investors and the tech news world. BlackBerry, however, is "here to stay," according to an open letter to customers from the company weeks ago, which also announced the forthcoming BBM app:
"We want customers to know that they can continue to count on us - we are here to stay. We have substantial cash on our balance sheet and we have no debt. We are restructuring our cost base and this is a very painful transition, but it will make us financially stronger and we want to get that message directly to our customers."
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