They seem to be sprouting everywhere. Now, IBM, Microsoft and Yahoo! are joining the growing crop of wireless and communications providers aligning their products and services with Research in Motion’s Blackberry.

Blackberry provides optimized messaging capabilities, large screens, intuitive navigation and push-based connectivity. And now Yahoo! Messenger service on the Blackberry platform allows consumers to see if friends are online, send and receive instant messages, have multiple conversations at once, and more. Pre-installed, full color graphical Yahoo! Messenger clients will be on Blackberry devices this year, the two companies announced.

Similar agreements with IBM and Microsoft will extend enterprise instant messaging to Blackberry subscribers through connectivity with Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005 and the Blackberry Enterprise Server. The IBM agreement will enable enterprise instant messaging via the Blackberry’s push-button wireless platform to Lotus Instant Messaging and Web Conferencing. It’s due out late in 2005.

Blackberry’s new 7520 handheld, with a speakerphone and long-range digital walkie-talkie, and its 7250 dual-band hand-held with Bluetooth technology are the rising stars.

	Personal Digital Assistants Sales to Dealers
	Unit Sales (Thousands)	Dollar Sales (Millions)	Average Unit Price
2000	5,750	1,265	220
2001	6,525	1,077	165
2002	6,250	875	140
2003	6,375	759	119
2004	6,500	657	101
2005p	6,633	591	89

_{Source: CEA Market Research, 1/05}