Research In Motion Ltd (BBRY) BlackBerry Users: What Are You Worth?

Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) BlackBerry has been spending a lot of time as of late in improving the user experience. We have touched on this here, and will be sure to bring you the same types of updates in the near future.

While there is nothing wrong with BlackBerry doing its part in improving the user experience, there is a question that many people have on their mind: what is a BlackBerry user worth to the company?

Research in Motion Ltd. (BBRY)As you know, Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) BlackBerry has lost quite a bit of market share over the past five years. While the company is on the comeback trail, it has yet to catch up to the leaders in the smartphone market.

Asymco recently tackled this question, and shared the following information in its report:

“Last week BlackBerry announced that it had 72 million subscriber accounts. The current market capitalization is $5.4 billion and enterprise value (i.e. excluding net cash) is about $2.8 billion.

That implies a net present value of about $40 for each account. This is quite a drop from early 2010 when the value was $866.”

As you can see, a Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) BlackBerry user is not worth nearly as much today as it was just three years ago. This goes a long way in showing just how far the company has fallen in a relatively short period of time.

It is safe to assume that BlackBerry is never going to reach the user value of 2010. While you can never say never, this would be a huge increase for a company that has struggled as of late.

On the next page, we are going to share a graph, courtesy of Asymco, showing the change. Before you check out the graph, here is an assessment from Asymco on the most intriguing aspects of the study:

“First, the peak in US consumption seems to have happened about two years prior to global peak.

Second, that the collapse in value per user occurred in advance to the peak in users. This is, of course, linked to other user base leading indicators such as device sales momentum. But the drop indicates that there was no perceived value in the BlackBerry install base to begin with. As devices went, so did the company.”

With the Research In Motion Ltd (NASDAQ:BBRY) BlackBerry 10 operating system picking up steam, we will keep a close eye on this story to see if things get better for the company in the near term.

Once again, be sure to check out the graph on the following page.