BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) has come up with a new edition of its Z series phone especially for Indonesia called the Jakarta Edition, which will be available for sale from 15 May at a price of 2,199,000 Indonesia Rupiah.This phone will be the first launch made after John Chen took over as the new CEO. BlackBerry was once a dominant player in the mobile industry, but in recent years it has lost a major market share to the rivals’ such as Samsung and Apple. As far as Indonesia in concerned, the company has enjoyed huge success here and it is a key market for the mobile maker.
“From conception to delivery, the BlackBerry Z3, Jakarta Edition was designed specifically with our Indonesian customers in mind,” Mr Chen said in a statement.
A lot at stake
The BlackBerry Z3 was announced in February, and this phone is customized with local apps and content. This phone was launched after it entered into a five-year deal with Foxconn, which is an electronic products and components maker based in Taiwan. This handset known as the Z3 Jakarta Edition will be available by mid-May for less than $200, and its success will decide the company’s future in smartphone business, and also it’s tie-up with the contract manufacturing giant Foxconn.
“If this device allows them [BlackBerry] to grow again, even if it’s just small, steady growth, that’s a success in itself. That says there is still room for BlackBerry in Indonesia,” said Ryan Lai, market analyst at consultancy IDC.
BlackBerry aims to reverse emerging market slump
BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) reported in February a net loss of $5.9 billion for the latest Financial Year. For the quarter ending March, the loss of $423 million was recorded, which was not only less than expected, but also lower than the loss of $4.4 billion last quarter.
Mr Chen, who took charge of the struggling firm late last year, has said the firm was on “a path to returning to growth and profitability”.
BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) hopes that its device and others to follow would help the company gain back some part of the share that it has lost to its rivals namely Apple’s iPhone running on iOS and Samsung Electronics Co’s devices running the Android OS.
