ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF BLACKBERRY

ORIGIN

BlackBerry is a line of smartphone devices developed and designed by Research In Motion (RIM). The first BlackBerry smartphone was released in 1999. BlackBerry; the name decided after a founding member noted that the tiny keys on RIM's device resembled a group of seeds. so the company decided a variety of seeded fruits and vegetables before ultimately deciding on "BLACKBERRY" since RIM's devices were largely colored black at that time. BlackBerry devices are smartphones, which are designed to function as personal digital assistants, portable media players, internet browsers, gaming devices, cameras and much more. They are primarily known for their ability to send and receive (push) email and instant messages(pinging) while maintaining a high level of security through on-device message encryption. 

HISTORY

The first BlackBerry device, the 850, was introduced in 1999 as a two-way pager in Munich, Germany. The reason for the monumental growth of BlackBerry is explainable because in 1999 it was little more than a mobile pager. It did integrate with existing enterprise email, though most consumers didn’t really have a need for a mobile email device. Cell phones in general weren’t even big in the consumer market at that point, so the need for a wireless PDA was expectedly lacking. But it did provide corporate data access, an organizer, calendar, paging, and wireless Internet, so it was of great use to businesses who wanted a more mobile workforce. After the launch 1999, in November 2004 RIM announced that there were over 2 million subscribers worldwide, it rose to 5 million in 2005 after 9 months it rose to 14 million subscribers and as of October 2011, there were seventy million subscribers worldwide to BlackBerry which has now risen enormously to over a hundred million subscribers in 2012. BlackBerry devices support a large variety of instant messaging features, with the most popular being the unique BlackBerry Messenger  service. BlackBerry accounts for 7.2% of mobile device sales worldwide in 2012, making its manufacturer Research In Motion (RIM) the fourth most popular device maker (25% of mobile device sales are smartphones) after the likes of the top: 

1.       South Korea Samsung 25.4%

2.       Finland Nokia 22.5%

3.       Canada BlackBerry 20.2%

4.       United State Apple Inc 9.5%

5.       United State Motorola 6%

6.       South Korea LG 5.2%

 

The consumer BlackBerry Internet Service is available in 91 countries worldwide on over 500 mobile service operators using various mobile technologies.