TORONTO — John Sims knew when he left his job with SAP AG to take over the enterprise business at embattled smartphone maker BlackBerry Ltd. that significant challenges lay ahead.
It didn’t phase him.
On the contrary, it was the prospect of solving those very challenges that prompted him to accept the job when his former SAP colleague, BlackBerry chief executive John Chen, asked him to join him in Waterloo, Ont.
This is an opportunity that we think doesn’t come along often
“It’s a challenge, I mean frankly, there are several of us on the management team who wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t a challenge,” Mr. Sims told a group of reporters during a BlackBerry partners conference in Toronto on Wednesday.
“I had a very good job at SAP. I could have stayed there until I wanted to just retire and go off and play golf or something. We’re here because of two things: One, it is a big challenge. And two, because we think we can get it done, and we’re excited by that opportunity. This is an opportunity that we think doesn’t come along often, so yeah, it’s a challenge, but I think you see that the management team is prepared to tackle tough decisions and get them done quickly.”
If BlackBerry is to reverse its flagging fortunes, stabilize its business and return to profitability, the divisions under Mr. Sims’ supervision — namely the company’s core enterprise and security offerings as well as the BlackBerry Messenger instant messaging platform — will be key to any turnaround.
Since assuming control of the struggling smartphone maker in November, Mr. Chen has made it clear that BlackBerry’s enterprise business, which supplies smartphones and security technology to corporations and government agencies, is his first priority as he attempts to turn around the company.
Earlier this year, BlackBerry unveiled eBBM Suite, which is designed to integrate BBM deeper into the security infrastructure of regulated industries, such as governments, financial institutions and companies in the health care field.
Part of the eBBM strategy involves BBM Protected, which enables enterprise BBM users to send encrypted messages within an organization, or with BBM users are other institutions that are also using BBM Protected.
“We’re working on a series of other things that relate to BBM to continue that move to BBM in the enterprise space,” Mr. Sims said.
“That doesn’t mean to say that BBM is not important in the consumer space, it’s very important to us in the consumer space, but we also think that part of the bigger picture of monetizing BBM is monetizing it within the enterprise and leveraging it there.”
BlackBerry also plans to introduce a new version of its BlackBerry Enterprise Service (BES) technology, known as BES 12, later this year.
The new BES 12 will enable companies to manage older BlackBerrys running the company’s BB7 software, as well as new BlackBerrys running on BB10 — something previous versions of the technology could not do — in addition to rival devices running software from Apple Inc., Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp.
We’ve been very forthright and open with them in talking about what our vision is going forward
Mr. Sims said that while BlackBerry’s enterprise customers still have questions about the company’s future, he believes that many are buying into Mr. Chen’s turnaround vision.
“I think they wouldn’t be doing their jobs if they didn’t ask those questions, so I think we expect people will ask those questions and I think we’ve been very forthright and open with them in talking about what our vision is going forward and what we see for the company,” he said.
“That said, they are also encouraged by the swift action we’ve taken to be able to stabilize the company from a financial point of view, provide robustness to the balance sheet, and the discussion that [Mr. Chen] has had in the press about achieving cash flow break even by the end of this year and then achieving profitability in FY16 at some point.”
https://business.financialpost.com/2014/05/08/blackberry-ltd-enterprise-chen/?__lsa=10e5-2cef