RIM CMO on BlackBerry 10: “at launch we will have more than 70,000 apps available”

The love for RIM is slowly building back up and you must, at the very least, commend the Waterloo-based company for surviving so much negativity over the past few months. Some investors bolted a long time ago and declared the company cannot return the glory they once had. However, amidst all this turmoil, RIM and their 80 million subscribers are poised to embark on what will possibly be the most talked about mobile story of 2013. We’ll be live in Toronto as RIM officially unveils BlackBerry 10, their new “mobile computing platform,” and their long awaited BlackBerry 10 smartphones on January 30, 2013.

There’s an interesting interview in Forbes with Frank Boulben, RIM’s CMO, and he notes that he was intrigued to join the company and be part of “what could be the greatest comeback in tech history.” As for the BlackBerry 10 marketing strategy he’s implementing, first is to start with “influencers,” also known as celebrities, to help spread the word. We’ve already seen this happen with Russell Simmons as he boldly stated “They are back!” Then we’ll see a big advertising push and social campaigns via Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

Boulben also noted that part of the road to success for BlackBerry 10 is to educate the public on “what the device is capable of, that is a fundamental aspect.” In addition, an area of concern is the number of apps that will be available at launch. RIM has already shown off Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Foursquare, but has never communicated a solid number of how many we can expect, only that there’ll be thousands available. In the interview, Boulben stated they have a best in class browser, a fantastic multimedia experience and “at launch we will have more than 70,000 apps available.” That is promising.

Boulben also noted that carriers are interested in moving away from the duopoly that exists today, presumably he means Android and iOS. Just over six weeks to go…

Source: Forbes