BlackBerry Losing Stranglehold Over Hedge Fund World

BlackBerry’s days as the king of Wall Street mobile devices are numbered.

I recently sat down with Bart McDonough, CEO of Agio Technology, which offers managed IT services for hedge funds, and he says that smart phones such as the iPhone and those that run the Android operating system are quickly gaining ground.

Norman, Okla.-based Agio manages between 1,200 and 1,300 mobile devices, according to McDonough. He says that while BlackBerry is still the dominant mobile device used by his clients—between 70 and 75 percent of the devices Agio manages are BlackBerrys—Research In Motion (RIM), the maker of BlackBerry, is losing ground fast.

"BlackBerry's stranglehold has certainly weakened," McDonough says. They are still the majority, he says, but are losing ground rapidly, and the number of Agio clients using BlackBerrys is "decreasing quickly."

I personally have had several conversations with traders from hedge funds who lament the fact that they are still tied to their BlackBerrys. Clearly, a sea change is coming. In recent months, several major firms—including Bank of America, Citi, JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs—have begun to look into allowing their traders to use Apple's iPhone and/or an Android phone.

As those major investment banks start to blaze a new trail, it's only a matter of time until major buy-side firms cut the cord with BlackBerry as well. This is not to say that RIM's smart phone will go the way of the dinosaur, but by this time next year I think you will see BlackBerry’s penetration rate on Wall Street dip below 50 percent.

It’s hard to believe that the infamously nicknamed "CrackBerry"—in reference to BlackBerry’s addictive nature—could ever be dethroned. But ask an iPhone user whether they’d consider using another device and the answer is a resounding “no”—dropped calls notwithstanding.