Nigeria’s telecommunications giant, MTN, has announced it is decommissioning its BlackBerry service.
MTN Nigeria this afternoon sent the announcement using Short Message Service (SMS) to my BlackBerry Q10 device, one of the phones it is stopping the service for, saying “Dear customer, MTN BlackBerry service will be decommissioned on 27/01/2017”.
BlackBerry users like me have wondered why MTN is giving the short notice.
Last year, WhatsApp announced it is dropping support for BlackBerry OS, which the messaging platform eventually effected December 31 2016, but BlackBerry 10 OS was granted grace till the end of June 2017.
It seems last year saw the end of so many good things. Last year as well, BlackBerry gave up its phone making business to China’s TCL, announcing that “Software is the New BlackBerry”.
In 2009, about 70% of Smartphones sold at the time had OS offered by BlackBerry and Nokia. Both BlackBerry and Nokia failed to gain traction with Smartphone users, with BlackBerry alone accounting for less than 1% of the market before it closed business.
Today, Mobile OS offered by Google, Apple and Microsoft accounts for more than 90% of mobile device sales.
The business of business is to make profit. With BlackBerry out of business, and the future of China’s TCL yet to be ascertained even when the Chinese tech firm rumoured some brands will be launching later this year, MTN sees no reason in keeping the business of BlackBerry service.
“Please upgrade to a smartphone and enjoy 100% bonus on any data bundle purchased,” MTN said in the announcement.
BlackBerry phones are no longer smartphones I have read MTN to mean there. But, can I win the argument? Probably phones running on Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS are the smartphones MTN would refer to.
The BlackBerry Absolute, BlackBerry Complete, BlackBerry 10 and every other MTN BlackBerry bundles are affected beginning from January ending.
MTN is the first to decommission BlackBerry service. Let’s see if other Nigerian telecoms firms offering BlackBerry services will follow suit.