Well, this is kind of a surprise. BlackBerry and T-Mobile have had a bit of a rocky relationship in recent months, with T-Mo ceasing in-store sales of BlackBerry 10 hardware last year and then touting its $0 down iPhone 5s as a "great offer for BlackBerry users," a promo that BlackBerry CEO John Chen described as "inappropriate." Things seemed to be improving with the introduction of a recent T-Mobile BlackBerry trade-in offer, but apparently the relationship between those two companies is still strained.
BlackBerry has announced that it has no plans to renew its agreement with T-Mobile for the carrier to sell BlackBerry products when the existing deal ends on April 25. BlackBerry CEO John Chen says that while the two firms have had a good relationship for several years, their "strategies are not complimentary" at this time.
Any current T-Mobile customers with a BlackBerry device aren't expected to see any changes in the service and support that they receive. BlackBerry says that it'll work with T-Mo to provide customer service to those users and that it's also collaborating with other carriers to help anyone that wants to switch to a new operator and continue to use a BlackBerry device as their daily driver. T-Mobile has yet to issue a comment on this matter.
As I mentioned before, we've known for a while now that BlackBerry and T-Mobile haven't had the smoothest of partnerships. Still, it's kind of a surprise to see BlackBerry opting not to renew its licensing agreement with T-Mobile, especially considering that BlackBerry is already on a pretty rough road with financial losses and new BlackBerry 10 hardware that's being outsold by its years-old BlackBerry 7 products.
What do you think of BlackBerry's decision? Do you think it's wise for the company to not renew its deal with T-Mobile?
Via BlackBerry
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