T-Mobile Drops Blackberry From Retail Stores
By Jotham Sederstrom September 30, 2013 2:00 pm
reprintsT-Mobile US, Inc. will drop the once-popular BlackBerry smartphone devices from its retail store inventory, according to a recent Reuters report.
The plan to drop BlackBerry is due to “weakening customer sales,” David Carey, executive vice president for corporate services, told the news agency.
In recent years, BlackBerry struggled to keep up with the growing iPhone and Android devices. The company enabled Wi-Fi on its devices and recently released its Z10 Z30 models to compete with higher-tech smartphones.
T-Mobile is among BlackBerry’s business relationships that are strained by recent struggles the company has seen with lagging interest and sales of its handsets. Although declining, the phones are still used in international markets and are still used among business professionals and enthusiasts in the United States.
The smartphone maker reported losses of $965 million during the second quarter of 2013. Revenue during the second quarter dropped to $1.6 billion, a 45 percent dip from the second quarter of 2012. The company is rumored to be considering going private as it struggles to survive.
In spite of the removal from its retail operations, T-Mobile will continue to sell BlackBerry to customers who request the phone by mail order only. T-Mobile is the fourth-largest wireless service provider in the United States and offers service to customers in the New York City market.
