Issuing an apology to its users, travel metasearch engine Kayak, revealed that it has ceased active support and maintenance for its BlackBerry app. Claiming to have ‘regrettably’ reached this practical decision, the company cited a declining audience as the main reason for this move.
Kayak says that according to it, the OS is just not working out to be a ‘great’ channel for consumer mobile applications. This does not sound like good news at all for the BlackBerry OS, which is trying hard to keep up with users’ demands for an increased number of apps and better developer support.
“When we started Kayak in 2004, we issued BlackBerries to the entire engineering team so we could communicate instantly 24/7. Today we’ve all switched, and it seems our users are doing the same. Our audience of BlackBerry users has been declining precipitously, and we can’t justify the cost any longer,” read a statement from Kayak.
“RIM was a smartphone pioneer and we thank them for what they’ve done, and wish them renewed success. BlackBerry was (and is) an amazing messaging platform. But it’s not working out to be a great channel for consumer mobile applications, which is what leads us to this sad post,” continued the notification.
As MobileBurn points out, although the company will be dropping active support for the application, it insists that the website will still be accessible through the BlackBerry browser. Currently, the Kayak app may be downloaded on other gadgets like the iPhone as well as Android, Windows Phone 7 and Nokia smartphones.
The abandonment of BlackBerry app support by Kayak sure seems to be ringing alarm bells for RIM, whose hopes of a proper revival hang on the QNX-based BlackBerry 10.