![]()
The company increased ad spending in U.S. measured media to
$68.9 million in the first half of this year from $47.8 million in
the first half of last year, a 44.2% increase, according to Kantar
Media.
The company changed its name to BlackBerry, the brand on its
line of mobile devices,
from Research in Motion in late January, part of a publicity
push as it introduced its BlackBerry 10 mobile operating system and
the Q10 and Z10 smartphones. The Q10 was touted in particular for
its physical keyboard, a BlackBerry staple that's been noticeably
absent from devices from competitors Apple and Samsung.
The company also enlisted celebrities like singer Alicia Keys,
author Neil Gaiman and filmmaker Robert Rodriguez for a campaign
designed to emphasize that its phones were for creative people, not
just office-bound professionals. BlackBerry ran its first Super
Bowl commercial a few days later.
But the efforts appear to have failed to make a dent in the
increasingly saturated high-end smartphone market.
BlackBerry said Friday that its second-quarter revenue was
approximately $1.6 billion, compared with the $3.03 billion average
estimate according to analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Just years ago, BlackBerry was, by far, the U.S. smartphone
market leader. BlackBerry's mobile operating system had a 41.5%
U.S. market share at its peak in Dec. 2009. That market share
dwindled to just 6.4% in Dec. 2012 as Apple's iOS and Google's Android became the
predominant mobile platforms. Android and iOS had respective market
shares of 53.4% and 36.3% in Dec. 2012.
~ With Bloomberg News ~