Research In Motion Ltd., maker of the BlackBerry smartphone, fell to its lowest level in more than a year following reports that Verizon Wireless, the largest U.S. wireless carrier, will start selling Apple Inc.’s iPhone.
RIM dropped $3.22, or 6.1 percent, to $49.75 after Bloomberg News reported that Verizon Wireless would start selling the iPhone to its customers in January, citing two people familiar with the plans. AT&T Inc., the country’s second- largest wireless carrier, has been the exclusive provider of the iPhone in the U.S.
Verizon Wireless has been marketing RIM’s BlackBerry, as well as phones from Motorola Inc. and HTC Corp. that use Google Inc.’s Android software. Apple could sell between 8 million and 9 million iPhones through Verizon each year, cutting into BlackBerry sales, said Charles Wolf, an analyst with Needham & Co. in New York who covers both RIM and Apple.
“It looks to me that about 10 percent of RIM’s sales are at risk from a Verizon iPhone,” he said.
Wolf estimates that Verizon accounts for about 50 percent of BlackBerry sales in the U.S. In the past year, Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM has sought to diversify its sales in countries outside the U.S. and through carriers other than Verizon. The U.S. now accounts for 45 percent of BlackBerry shipments, down from 70 percent a year ago, Wolf said.
“If the iPhone takes share equally from BlackBerry phones and Android phones, that works out to about a million units worth of impact to RIM sales,” he said. “It’s not an inconsequential hit, but it would have been worse a year ago.”
Tenille Kennedy, a spokeswoman for RIM, didn’t immediately return e-mail and voice-mail messages seeking comment after regular business hours.
RIM is likely to use the Verizon development as a chance to boost its business at AT&T, said Tavis McCourt, an analyst with Morgan Keegan & Co. in Nashville, Tennessee. During RIM’s June 24 earnings conference call, Co-Chief Executive Officer James Balsillie said there will be significant advertising campaigns coming later this year in the U.S.
“He called it something like the biggest campaign ever,” McCourt said. “The only carrier who could do a campaign that big is AT&T.”
No comments:
Post a Comment