Gartner to IT: If You’re Using BlackBerry, Abandon Ship

Analyst firm Gartner is recommending that all BlackBerry enterprise customers abandon ship.

The company has come forth to state that clients should take “no more than six months to consider and implement alternatives to BlackBerry,” according to Matt Hamblen over at CITEworld.

“We’re emphasizing that all clients should immediately ensure they have backup mobile data management plans and are at least testing alternative devices to BlackBerry,” said Gartner analyst Bill Menezes in an email interview with Hamblen.

Gartner will soon release a full report with details on this firm stance, the article states.

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BlackBerry this month reported a $1 billion tax loss, a steep revenue dive, and a plan for 4,500 layoffs.

The company recorded revenue from the sale of 3.7 million smartphones during last quarter. The majority of those sales were BlackBerry 7 devices, not the new Z10. The company said that revenue for sales of the new devices, which were shipped to carriers, won’t be recorded until they’re sold to end-users. In total, 5.9 million BlackBerry devices were sold to end-users during the period.

BlackBerry still has $2.6 billion in cash and investments, but its burning through that fast. The company spent $500 million of its cash on-hand during the quarter.

“We are very disappointed with our operational and financial results this quarter and have announced a series of major changes to address the competitive hardware environment and our cost structure,” Thorsten Heins, president and CEO of BlackBerry, said in a corporate release last week. “We understand how some of the activities we are going through create uncertainty, but we remain a financially strong company with $2.6 billion in cash and no debt.”