With the launch of the last-chance Z10 around the corner, Blackberry is giving itself a pep talk to keep those hopes high. According to CEO Thorsten Heins, the iPhone is hardly in the race Blackberry’s fixin’ to win, because it’s old news.
In an interview with the Australian Financial Review, Heins made it clear he thinks Apple is slipping, and that BlackBerry belongs with the companies that are beating it out:
Apple did a fantastic job in bringing touch devices to market … They did a fantastic job with the user interface, they are a design icon. There is a reason why they were so successful, and we actually have to admit this and respect that.
…History repeats itself again I guess … the rate of innovation is so high in our industry that if you don’t innovate at that speed you can be replaced pretty quickly. The user interface on the iPhone, with all due respect for what this invention was all about is now five years old.
…The point is that you can never stand still. It is true for us as well. Launching BB10 just put us on the starting grid of the wider mobile computing grand prix, and now we need to win it.
Of course being on the starting grid isn’t quite that great when you’re also a few laps behind. [AFR]