MoneyWatch Tech

RIM's Nightmare: Corporations Don't Need It After All

By Erik Sherman

Updated on: December 1, 2010 / 1:45 PM EST / MoneyWatch

As Apple (AAPL) strode ahead with the iPhone and Google (GOOG) caught up with Android shipments, Research in Motion (RIMM) has been sweating. And recent news that Bank of America and Citi may let workers opt for an iPhone instead of a BlackBerry won't help it sleep calmly. No wonder â€" this is an indication that RIM was so late in answering competitive offerings that even its corporate advantages may not be enough to save its business.

Clearly this is an early indicator -- one far from showing a decisive switch from Blackberrys to iPhones. The banks are testing the concept, not rolling it out, and even then the iPhone will be a potential substitute. Yes, many employees would switch, but many would probably stick with RIM's products.

(An aside: could this be an Apple-leaked story? Three people knowing of the same type of testing being done at competing corporations make it sound like something spread by a vendor, and one consultancy is unlikely to do projects for both at the same time.)

That said, it's a far more significant development than Dell (DELL) moving 25,000 employees from BlackBerrys to Windows Phone 7. In that case, you have to chalk up much of the decision to a PR move, as Dell is now a Windows Phone 7 smartphone manufacturer.

However, financial services corporations tend to be early adopters and trend drivers in IT. Their need to constantly improve information delivery and processing, which are the essence of their businesses, means they land on the early side of trends. And there does seem to be a growing interest in giving employees the choice of computer and phone they're most comfortable with.

Yes, RIM knows how to do corporate computing, but to think that Google, Apple, and Microsoft (MSFT) can't figure it out is insane. RIM management reacted too slowly, and now it may have lost the advantage of installed base, no matter what it does with a tablet that won't ship until next year. The company isn't financially a Palm, which needed an acquisition to avoid going under, but at this point I'm not sure it can avoid an acquisition as competitors move ahead and existing customers consumer alternatives.

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Image: Flickr user kevindooley, CC 2.0.