Ford switching 3,300 workers from BlackBerry to iPhone this year
Ford Switching Employees to IPhones From BlackBerries — Ford Motor Co. (F) is deploying iPhones for corporate use to employees worldwide, scoring a win for Apple Inc. (AAPL) as it seeks to lure more corporate customers.
Context & Ripple Effects
Ford's move extends an enterprise migration that has been running since at least Halliburton's 2012 decision to ditch BlackBerrys for iOS and a federal agency's switch to the iPhone the same year, with the Wall Street Journal reporting in January 2014 that Apple devices were flowing into corporate fleets broadly. The automaker is now deploying iPhones worldwide to 3,300 workers this year.
The timing is pointed: in February 2014 Ford was reported dropping Microsoft for BlackBerry's QNX in its Sync system, so the company is keeping BlackBerry software in the car while cutting BlackBerry hardware from its pockets. It lands weeks after BlackBerry launched BBM Protected with FIPS 140-2 encryption and positioned the square-screened Passport for spreadsheet users — a security-and-productivity pitch aimed squarely at holding exactly these accounts.
First-order effects
- BlackBerry loses a marquee North American automotive account for its handsets, while Apple gains a global corporate deployment of 3,300 devices and a reference customer in an industry it has been courting since its 2012 enterprise push.
Second-order effects
- Rival enterprises watching Ford — and the automakers adjacent to it — face pressure to standardize on iOS or justify why they still carry BlackBerry handsets, accelerating procurement decisions across the sector.
- BlackBerry's response channels are already visible in its own moves: BBM Protected's FIPS 140-2 encrypted messaging and the Passport's spreadsheet-first design are attempts to re-anchor the company in regulated-enterprise software rather than volume handset sales.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, BlackBerry's handset business shrinks toward a niche of security-critical customers while the company's value rests on QNX-style embedded software and enterprise messaging — a split between where Ford keeps BlackBerry (in-car) and drops it (in-hand).
- Enterprise mobility consolidates around iOS plus device-management tooling, turning corporate phone purchasing from a hardware choice into a platform commitment that competitors must answer with ecosystems rather than devices.
The trend: Corporate smartphone fleets are migrating from BlackBerry to iPhone, leaving BlackBerry to pivot toward embedded software and encrypted enterprise services as its handset base erodes.