BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB) turned out to be one of the hottest pick, in a year or so, as investors trusted John Chen’s turnaround strategy, who also completes a year at Blackberry. This year, for the first time since 2009, the stock is on the track to outperform the Nasdaq composite Index .
BlackBerry up, but not up enough
Canadian Smartphone maker’s shares are up 58% to $10.25 since Chen joined as a chief executive officer a year ago. For the same period Nasdaq has gained only 18%. A gain of 38% in 2014 by Blackberry is on track to outperform Nasdaq for the first time in five years.
Still BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB)’s shares still have a long way to go breach its peak closing price of $147.55 in June 2008, when its market value touched $83 billion. Chen, who previously had done some incredible turnaround at Sybase Inc. and sold it to SAP AG for $5.8 Billion, believe the company’s odds of a successful turnaround are better than 80/20.
Also, Blackberry recently received some favorable remarks from Hollywood’s most recognizable stars like Kim Kardashian, who in an interview said that she love her Blackberry, and will make efforts to make sure that the phone don’t go extinct.
More efforts needed
This positive change in the stock price of the company is because of the company’s CEO, who joined Blackberry after a proposed $4.7 billion buyout collapsed. The CEO introduced some initial steps such as outsourced some manufacturing and sold real estate. Also, Chen is more focused on the core business of the company.
Chen is making efforts to bring back phones with signature physical keyboards, along with offering more software-based services. Such efforts have helped BlackBerry Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) (TSE:BB) to come back on the track for break-even cash flow by the end of this fiscal year and return to profit the next year.
The next big achievement for the Canadian company is to see whether it will be able to persuade big corporate customers to use its new business server known as BES 12, to manage their devices, believe analysts at Raymond James Financial Inc.
“Ultimately it’s going to come down to whether the company gets back on track,” Li said. “It’s still wait-and-see.”
