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Rumors, Rumors and More Rumors.. BlackBerry takeover rumors, layoffs and Losing the Signal | CrackBerry.com

By Crackberry Bla1ze!

It has been a while since I’ve written a ‘From the Editor’s Desk’ post and I should probably write more of them, but to be honest I really need to feel pretty strongly about something in order to write them and the past few days have me a little fired up. With that out of the way, the past three days have been interesting for the BlackBerry world, made even more so when you consider the timing of everything, and some of it has me fired up. We’ve had a few new takeover rumors and BlackBerry has confirmed an unspecified number of layoffs along with a new common share purchase program. If that’s not enough, there were some rumblings about the possibility of BlackBerry using Samsung’s Exynos processors for some of their next-gen smartphones and to add even more to the mix there’s a new and dramatically titled book coming out about the “rise and fall of BlackBerry”, though that story is still ongoing.

Source: From the Editor’s Desk: BlackBerry takeover rumors, layoffs and Losing the Signal | CrackBerry.com

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A Conversation with BlackBerry CEO John Chen 

The Greater KW Chamber of Commerce hosted BlackBerry CEO John Chen for a special luncheon on May 5th with nearly 400 community builders and supporters in attendance. It was an outstanding and candid discussion between John and Chamber CEO Ian McLean. Thank you to BlackBerry and John Chen for taking the time to come and speak with us.

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Sticking to the plan: Chen says BlackBerry smartphone business will be profitable again | CrackBerry.com

Chen says BlackBerry phones are the entry point for customers into the company’s security business. BlackBerry can still provide a secure backbone for other devices like iPhones and Android phones, but Chen says you get the most security with a BlackBerry phone. There are a lot of important customers that still need that level of security. “I can only make iPhone so much more secure, but I can’t make it as secure as a BlackBerry device,” Chen said. “If you look at the US Army, they’re still rolling out all BlackBerry. If I tell them there are no more phones, I lose that account. The question is how do you make phones profitable at the volume those people represent?”

Source: Sticking to the plan: Chen says BlackBerry smartphone business will be profitable again | CrackBerry.com

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Jennifer Doidge named BlackBerry’s new VP of Corporate communications – NerdBerry

BlackBerry was left to fill a void when former VP of corporate communications Heidi Davidson, left BlackBerry. BlackBerry has hired Visa’s Jennifer Doidge as the new VP of Corporate communications. Doidge who spent 9 years with Visa holding multiple roles will be working out of Pleasanton, California and will answer to BalckBerry COO Marty Beard

Source: Jennifer Doidge named BlackBerry’s new VP of Corporate communications – NerdBerry

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Why Apple Needs BlackBerry`s Technology

Apple Rumored To Be Interested In Buying BlackBerry Apple Inc. AAPL 0.14% , the world’s largest corporation, was rumored to be looking at BlackBerry Ltd BBRY 0.05% as a possible acquisition target. Needless to say, the rumor received a wide variety of reactions from Wall Street. “I think the play with BlackBerry is a partnership play, not at all an acquisition,” Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdhry told Benzinga. “Apple will welcome BlackBerry as an App Store partner. They can publish their security software on App Store and people can download it — no different from what [other companies] have done.” Cody Willard, chairman of Scutify (a financial social network) and Futr (a futuristic messaging app), thinks Apple could buy BlackBerry to speed up its effort to get into car dashboards. Sean Udall, CIO of Quantum Trading Strategies and author of The TechStrat Report, thinks Apple would only acquire BlackBerry if the world’s largest governments asked Apple to step up and make an offer.

Source: Weekly Tech Highlights: Apple’s Battery Division, Why Apple Needs BlackBerry And More – Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), AOL Inc. (NYSE:AOL) | Benzinga

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What Does the Watchdox Acquisition Mean For BlackBerry Ltd.? | The Motley Fool Canada

What is Watchdox? Most of us are familiar with Dropbox. For those who aren’t, Dropbox allows users to store files in the cloud, making them accessible across different devices. Dropbox is perfect for individuals, but large organizations are looking for an added layer of security. This is where Watchdox comes in. With Watchdox, enterprises can track and control who is sharing, or viewing, or even printing a file. A file’s creator can set a time limit on the file’s access, and can wipe the file from other devices, even after it’s left the network. If a hacker tries to steal the file, he’ll only see a bunch of encrypted characters. For this reason, Watchdox is very popular with governments, and also with Hollywood studios, who don’t want to see their scripts leaked.

Source: What Does the Watchdox Acquisition Mean For BlackBerry Ltd.? | The Motley Fool Canada

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BlackBerry OS 10.3.2.500 leaks for BlackBerry Z30, Passport, Classic and Leap

BlackBerry OS 10.3.2.500 leaks for BlackBerry Z30, Passport, Classic and Leap

A new BlackBerry 10.3.2 build has been leaked for a range of devices powered with OS 10.

The leaked OS 10.3.2.500 has been released to a limited number of testers recently. Since BlackBerry Z30 shares similar upgrade files with Passport and Leap, the leaked version can be used to update those devices too, reports BBE which has posted the leaked files.

The leaked OS is in the form of .bar, Core OS and Radio files and currently there is no autoloader. But you can always create autoloaders if you know how to do it.

According to the folks at CrackBerry forum, the leaked OS is ‘buttery smooth’ and has the older swipe animation feature. Besides, its battery life is quite fine. However, the Android player seems to be slower and lags for most of the apks, and Fitbit call notifications are not working.

Other notable changes include fast boot timing and swipe up from lock screen back to original. There are a few hiccups too, such as the voice command not working properly and showing the wrong addresses when searching for locations in BlackBerry maps, confirms forum member, ezapper2.

Head over to the forum to know more about the fixes and changes in Blackberry OS 10.3.2.500. Given below are the download links for the leaked OS.

Download links

OS 10.3.2.500 .bar files for BlackBerry Passport

OS 10.3.2.500 Radio and Core OS for Z30

OS 10.3.2.500 apps, Core OS and radio for Z30

Do not use the beta firmware as a daily driver, as all the features might not function properly. Install the leaked firmware only if you are an advanced user and have a fair knowledge about the leaked OS.

via BlackBerry OS 10.3.2.500 leaks for BlackBerry Z30, Passport, Classic and Leap.

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BlackBerry acquires WatchDox – The Most Secured File Sharing Service – BBin

It’s no surprise that BlackBerry is the most secured platform when it comes to the Internet and their latest acquisition of Israel’s WatchDox takes them to the next level by adding another service to their bag of online file storage. WatchDox provides users to leverage online storage space just like Box, Dropbox, iCloud, Microsoft’s OneDrive but with a security layer on top, which makes it more appealing than competitors. BlackBerry is said to acquire the 2008 born company for about $150 million last week(official news to hit later today).

via BlackBerry acquires WatchDox – The Most Secured File Sharing Service – BBin.

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BlackBerry announces Q4 Fiscal 2015 Results | CrackBerry.com

Q4 Highlights

Normalized positive cash flow of $76 million in the quarter, reversing normalized cash use of ($784) million in Q4 FY14

Cash and investments balance of $3.27 billion at the end of the fiscal quarter, an increase of $608 million over Q4 FY14 and matching the highest balance in company history

Non-GAAP earnings of $0.04 per share, reversing a loss per share of ($0.08) in Q4 FY14

Non-GAAP operating income of $2 million reversing an operating loss of ($156) million in Q4 FY14

Non-GAAP gross margin of 48.3% and GAAP gross margin of 48.2%, with a third consecutive quarter of positive hardware gross margin

Software revenue of $67 million, a 20% increase over Q4 FY14

Announced a partnership with Google to support Android for Work

Launched the BlackBerry Classic in December, with support for the Classic and the previously-released Passport by major carriers, including Telus, Bell, Rogers, AT&T, Verizon, Vodafone and Orange

Completed the acquisition of Secusmart, a leader in high-security voice and text encryption

After the quarter at Mobile World Congress, announced the full-touch BlackBerry Leap and unveiled the upcoming BlackBerry device portfolio

Also at Mobile World Congress, announced the BlackBerry Experience Suite software portfolio that brings BlackBerry’s productivity, communication, collaboration and security across all smartphone and tablets running – iOS®, Android™, and Windows®

Other product announcements at Mobile World Congress included BES 12 Cloud, integration of WorkLife and SecuSUITE with Samsung KNOX, and Vodafone Germany’s rollout of Secusmart technology

“Our focus this past year was on getting our financial house in order while creating a multi-year growth strategy and investing in our product portfolio. We now have a very good handle on our margins, and our product roadmaps have been well received,” said Executive Chairman and CEO John Chen. “The second half of our turnaround focuses on stabilization of revenue with sustainable profitability and cash generation.”

via BlackBerry announces Q4 Fiscal 2015 Results | CrackBerry.com.

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AmigaONE X5000 is almost here..

After the success of the AmigaONE X1000 it quickly came apparent that using a end of life CPU was not a going to be a long term solution going forward as unfortunately demand out striped supply and the CPU prices started to go up and so it was never possible to decrease cost of the nemo board, a new solution was needed to really support the Amiga platform going forward so a £1.2 Million contract was signed to ensure this and a new motherboad would be needed. Project Cyrus began, the goal was simple to replace the X1000 with the goal of making it more affordable if possible and future proof the motherboard and have long term support in place, part of the contract with the makers of the system Varisys is that the board is to have at least 10 year support and this time the CPU in PPC terms to be used was to be the very latest CPU core and the motherboard was designed from the outset to be able to use three different CPU chips this not only gives A-EON options for the future but also protects them selves with falling into the same trap.

The Specs!

Cyrus+

CPU: P3041 / P5020 / P5040 1.5Ghz to 2.4Ghz

Co-processor: “Xena“ Dual Core 500 MHz Xmos XCore XS1-L2 128 SDS

GFX: uknown (most likly Radeon HD 5000+) Memory: 2x DDR3 SDRAM slots 16Gb max

6x USB 2.0

1x Gigabit Ethernet

2x PCIe x16 slots (1×16 or 2×8)

2x PCIe x1 slots

1x Xorro slot (gives access to “Xena”)

2x PCI legacy slots

2x RS-232

2x SATA 2 connectors

1x ISerial

1x MircoSD – Bios

via AmigaONE X5000.