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There’s this blogger over at ZDNet named Russell Shaw, and we regularly read his “The BlackBerry Beat” blog. The dude is BlackBerry through and through. And even when he provides us with just three paragraphs of information, we tend to eat it up (except when he’s expressing his unabashed hatred for anything Apple). Today, he shares a tidbit about a BlackBerry-branded iPhone.

It’s just a three paragraph ditty, so we feel bad about blockquoting. But hell, you guys deserve to know.

“But you can bet your next mortgage payment that RIM’s™ engineers are already working on the next design that mimics and probably leapfrogs the iPhone.”

It’s a great idea, actually. RIM proved last week that it could stand up to the iPhone hype. Yeah, their earnings reports were probably purposely delayed until the June 29th iPhone launch date, but that’s almost the point. Not only do they make useful devices, but they also know the name of the business strategy game. Under pressure, they know how to keep their cool and face the competition.

The idea of RIM creating an iPhone clone would represent RIM entering the personal phone market. True, many people own a BlackBerry for purely personal reasons — celebs are the first to come to mind. But for the most part, they’re a business device. The creation of an iPhone clone would place them in a more personal market.

The best part is that they would certainly make it a business phone, too. That’s one of the more looming complaints about the iPhone: it’s not exactly business compatible. But imagine if a company made a device with all of the same features, but also with the ability to sync with a company’s server. Now that’s a device that would be worth spending four hours on line for.

[ZDNet]

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