Friday, November 25, 2016

Blackberry Signs Deal With Ford



Big News: Blackberry is still around!! Ok, maybe this was just news to me, but in even bigger news: they signed a deal with Ford to to produce software that could power their first generation of mass-market self-driving cars. The Canadian company has announced that it is dedicating a team of engineers to help the car manufacturer incorporate a range of BlackBerry software — including its QNX Neutrino operating system, its Certicom security tech, and audio processing software — into future Ford cars. In addition to helping Ford utilize existing software, the new deal means BlackBerry can put itself at the center of Ford’s future plans for self-driving cars, helping the Canadian company in its stated aim of pivoting from a hardware company to a software one.

BlackBerry’s days of dominating the cellphone market are long gone but the company’s QNX subsidiary is its most promising hope for future success. How Ford’s self-driving car efforts pan out is yet to be seen — companies like Google, Baidu, and Mercedes-Benz all plan to have autonomous vehicles on roads at least a year before 2021 (Ford's projected date) — but the deal could help BlackBerry score similar arrangements with other manufacturers.

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