‘BlackBerry’ Recap: ‘Part II’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Glenn Howerton as Jim Balsillie in ‘Part II’ of ‘BlackBerry’. (Photo Courtesy of AMC.)

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode Two of ‘BlackBerry’. To revisit the Series Premiere, click here.

It is the hope of every business owner out there… that they not only find incredible success in their endeavors, but that they also corner the market and become untouchable. Because that creates sustainability in a place where sustainability rarely exists. Plus, it creates a legacy for the business, and makes it the standard for everyone. But alas, not everyone reaches that goal, since sometimes… businesses fail or they enjoy such rapid success, that they are quickly gobbled up by a bigger fish. One that sees a need to add them to their portfolio before they become untouchable. Which means that to truly obtain what they crave, a businessperson not only must create a true wonder, but they also have to be vigilant and even then… there are no guarantees.

If anything, this aspect of the business world is top of mind today, simply because it served as the focus of the next chapter of BlackBerry on AMC and AMC+. For when we caught up with Mike and Jim in ‘Part II’, things were going pretty darn well at RIM. After all, the product was a hit, people were enjoying their Quarks, and the money was rolling in. Allowing for innovation to take place since Mike and the gang were able to figure out how to create a built-in messenger for BlackBerry that would make them even more desirable as a product and well… that’s when the need for vigilance and true superiority came into play. Because just like that, the CEO of Palm Pilot paid the company a visit, with a proposition in hand.

Wherein, RIM would sell its product to Palm Pilot as part of a grand merger. One that would allow for Palm to dominate the market and well, neither Jim nor Mike liked that idea and that meant… desperate times called for desperate measure. For the threat was put on the table that if they didn’t sell, a hostile takeover was coming and that prompted Jim and Mike… to really look at the business differently. In that, they realized they needed bigger minds from an engineering standpoint, and the business needed to have less of a startup mentality and be treated seriously for a change and that prompted both men, to make some drastic changes to the company and their own day-to-day operations. Which for Jim, involved going out and recruiting the best of the best under some shady stock measures, and hiring new executives to run the business, and of course… sending out the directive that the sales team needed to sell as many phones as possible to bump up the stock price and keep Palm away from the company.

As for Mike, well he knew that Doug was becoming a problem and didn’t take the gig as seriously as he needed to, which meant… Mike needed to play sides and make use of the new asskicker Jim brought in to clean up the floor and well… for their efforts… there were more struggles before light appeared at the end of the tunnel. Because just like that… networks were being flooded by the glut of new phones and innovation had to come into play to make them work and keep them from crashing. And of course, Doug’s voice was the loudest in the room regardless, which still brought about laziness. But eventually, the engineers figured out how to reprogram towers to solve the network load and expand the network to handle more BlackBerry devices and Mike’s ability to passively play both sides, got the floor, and Doug in line. Making BlackBerry and RIM untouchable at last. 

But of course, that all came at a cost. Since corners were cut to innovate and create and bring talent into the fold and the faithful, may not quite believe in the mission as much as they used to with a touch of corporate autonomy coming into the fold. But it was how things went, and it was how at the time, Mike and Jim thought best to keep the company growing and thriving. But alas, we all know deep down, fast deals and corner cutting is no way to keep a company thriving and of course, those stock moves were likely not legal. Which means, it is only a matter of time before this push to be the best through wrong reasoning creates problems down the line. The kind that undoubtedly helped to bring this company to its end, and it will be interesting indeed to see how this helped contribute to the downfall of the RIM and BlackBerry, when this saga wraps up later tonight on AMC. Until next time.

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