One day, your gadget is the future — an indispensible tool of business or the pinnacle of entertainment. The next it’s a Rolodex, an awkward anachronism sitting on dusty thrift store shelves waiting to be used as a prop in some dinner theater production of Glengarry Glen Ross. Technology’s forward march is sometimes nostalgic — retro is a powerful marketing banner, a fact not lost on Motorola Mobility (NYSE:MMI) and its new Droid RAZR smartphone — but it never is sentimental. “Outdated” might as well mean “unprofitable.”
As Apple‘s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPad cuts into PC sales and Google‘s (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android operating system comes to further define the mobile device businesses of Samsung (PINK:SSNLF), HTC and many others, we’re taking a look at what gadgets are getting killed off by contemporary giants. By the time 2015 rolls around, expect to see these gadgets joining the Rolodex on that dusty thrift store shelf.
Research In Motion BlackBerry
Research In Motion’s (NASDAQ:RIMM) BlackBerry line, once the face of the entire smartphone industry, already is on life support. BlackBerrys accounted for nearly 19% of the global smartphone market in 2010 — a grip that’s shrunk to just below 12% as of the second quarter in 2011.
The remaining BlackBerry users out there are jumping ship as well. An UBS report released in September found that RIM retains only 33% of BlackBerry users when those consumers upgrade their phones — down from 62% in early 2010. That number should shrink even further given the recent global outage of numerous BlackBerry services.
While RIM isn’t giving up the BlackBerry ghost yet — the company unveiled its next-generation operating system on Tuesday — the rate at which consumers are abandoning the technology means the future is grim. If the BlackBerry survives into 2015, it will be as part of another company’s patent portfolio.
Apple iPod
Apple’s MP3 player come trans-media wonder device turned 10 years old on Sunday. Its success transformed the music industry and was integral in boosting Apple to prominence as the world’s most valuable technology company.
The old hard drive-based device, currently manufactured under the name iPod Classic, isn’t long for this world, though. Rumors that Apple will discontinue manufacturing the device have been getting louder as of late. Considering that these old-style players can’t access Apple’s lucrative iTunes and App Store storefronts, it makes sense for Apple to abandon them in favor of continuing the iPod Touch line.
It’s anyone’s guess, though, as to how long the iPod brand will survive. Apple’s iPhone and iPad might become cheap enough that they completely supplant the need for an iPod at all.
Nintendo DS/3DS
Nintendo (PINK:NTDOY) has had two periods of intense success in the United States. The first during the late ’80s and early ’90s was fueled by new enthusiasm for home video games among consumers. Its great renaissance came in 2004 when the company released the Nintendo DS portable gaming device.
Close to becoming the best-selling gaming device ever made with nearly 150 million sold over the past seven years, the Nintendo DS turned Nintendo shares into a desirable part of anyone’s tech-centric portfolio. Shares were trading around $77 by the end of 2007. Today they’re trading below $20. After years of controlling the portable gaming market, DS sales have plummeted as smartphone sales have skyrocketed.
The latest device in the line — the glasses-free 3D machine the Nintendo 3DS — has been such a monumental failure since its release in March that Nintendo had to cut its price from $250 to $170 within five months. It’s no wonder. Nintendo DS/3DS games cost up to $40 at retail, whereas smartphone games can be downloaded for 99 cents (or nothing at all in some cases.) Unless Nintendo can turn back time to when games were products that had to be bought at a store, the current models of Nintendo DS and 3DS won’t be around by the middle of this decade.
As of this writing, Anthony John Agnello did not own a position in any of the stocks named here. Follow him on Twitter at @ajohnagnello and become a fan of InvestorPlace on Facebook.
