After announcing BBM would be on windows phone, John Chen the CEO of BlackBerry at a candid interview with CNET at the Mobile World Congress recently also mentioned that if somebody comes to him with $19 billion he would sell Blackberry messenger. A comment he made a week after Facebook bought Whatsapp, a messaging application for smart phone up to $19 billion
BBM who has 85 million active users in comparison to Whatsapp’s over 450 million; has been seen to still hold quite a number of users of Blackberry phones, android phones and soon Windows phones. It’s certainly hard to see why Chen would be interested in taking such an offer as BBM has successfully branched off stage of being operated on Blackberry phones only but also all other smart phones, may be $19 billion which is more than three times BlackBerry’s current market cap is a good reason.
Chen said: “I work for the shareholders, if somebody comes to me with $19 billion, I would definitely sell it. I would recommend to the board to take it.” He also mentioned that the value of BBM was gotten from a huge level of engagement with enterprises and professionals. To make Blackberry’s messaging service more friendly they launched a range of products and services launched BBM Enterprise Suite (eSuite).
Why would such a statement be made? Consider this as a nugget to feed on. We know for sure that no offers have been made yet to buy BBM but we can sense that a wise speculation of this possibility has been clearly stated by Chen. Who else could be buying off companies after Facebook acquired Whatsapp, we need to watch out and see.