SAN JOSE—BlackBerry Balance isn't a magic pill that will ensure that Research in Motion's effort to recapture enterprise business succeeds. But the new dual-profile capability that's built into RIM's next-generation BlackBerry 10 operating system could be a very attractive deal sweetener for CIOs who are trying to cope with the "bring your own device" trend in the workplace.
RIM is touting BB10, a flashy new smartphone platform that has been delayed until the first quarter of next year, as the engine that will bring the struggling company back from the abyss. At this week's BlackBerry Jam developers conference, RIM executives have been talking up the more consumer-friendly features in BB10. That includes Peek, which offers abbreviated updates to a user's social networks without the need to open up a Facebook or Twitter app, the addition of music and movies to BlackBerry App World, the "Flow" design of the OS that "frees" us from the "tyranny of the app grid," and so forth.
Balance, which is squarely aimed at the business customer, hasn't been getting as much play here, but it might just be the most innovative thing RIM is rolling out with BB10. The idea is pretty simple—Balance lets a user maintain two separate profiles on a single BlackBerry phone. The two profiles are securely walled off from each other, according to RIM, and flipping between them only requires the push of a button, or more accurately, the swipe of a touch-screen icon. That means a business user could maintain a work profile that adheres to their IT department's protocols and compliance requirements, while also having a profile on the same phone for personal use.
"A lot people these days go so far as to keep two phones, one for work and one for personal," said RIM vice president of global alliances and business development Martyn Mallick. Speaking to PCMag at BlackBerry Jam, Mallick made the case for Balance as a nice compromise between IT administrators' concerns and employees' desire for work devices they actually enjoy using.
The RIM executive also argued that people's perception of BlackBerry devices has been hurt, oddly enough, because they have been using company-issued phones locked down by IT.
"I've had people say to me that they like their BlackBerry but they wish they could get apps on it," Mallick said, explaining that company phones often have the full range of BlackBerry features disabled, like access to BlackBerry App World, leading users to think they're not as powerful, fun, or useful as they really are.
BlackBerry Balance solves that problem by letting a user keep a profile that's able to access the full scope of BB10's features and services while also enabling a business to limit what can be done on the company network via the second, partitioned work profile.
A business might not want to allow employees to visit certain websites through the company portal, for example, or enable access to social media services like Facebook or LinkedIn. With BlackBerry Balance, native apps like the BlackBerry browser can actually be configured to function completely differently in a locked-down work profile than they do when a user is in their personal profile.
As RIM tries to take on Apple, Google, and Microsoft in the enterprise with new BB10 products, Balance looks to be a unique value proposition for the company. The so-called consumerization of IT has flipped the script on IT departments in recent year, as employees from the executive level on down have started demanding that they be allowed to use iPhones and Android devices for work rather than a phone built to easily tie into a secure corporate network. That trend continues to give IT admins headaches, but it doesn't look to be ending anytime soon.
If RIM has a nice solution to the problem in Balance, the BlackBerry maker will still have its work cut out for it in trying to recapture the enterprise share it's lost to Apple and Google, and the challenge it faces from Microsoft's upcoming Windows Phone 8 platform. Recently, it was reported that Yahoo has pulled the plug on company-issued BlackBerrys. A few more high-profile defeats like that and it won't matter how much Balance RIM brings to the table with BlackBerry 10 when it finally arrives.
For more, see Fighting RIM Puts All Its Eggs in the BB10 Basket, as well as Hands On With RIM's BlackBerry 10 and the slideshow above.
For more from Damon, follow him on Twitter @dpoeter.
No comments:
Post a Comment