BlackBerry Chief Executive John Chen introduces the Passport smartphone during an official launch event in Toronto, September 24, 2014.
BlackBerry Ltd.'s dominance in the world handset market may have died, but the smartphone maker's intellectual property lives on, apparently with vigour.
A Thomson Reuters data analysis for the second consecutive year listed the Canadian tech firm as part of its 100 Global Innovators.
The 2014 ranking, which placed BlackBerry among industry heavyweights such as Google, Apple, Boeing, General Electric and Hewlett-Packard, examined patent-related metrics to decide which companies best represent what Basil Moftah, president of Thomson Reuters IP & Science, called the "absolute vanguard of innovation."
The Waterloo, Ont.-based business was the only Canadian firm mentioned on the fourth annual innovators list.
Laura Gaze, director of IP & Science at Thomson Reuters, acknowledged that BlackBerry's inclusion "may seem odd to some."
The company currently holds less than 1 per cent of global handset market share, according to U.S. market research company International Data Corp. Nevertheless, its sheer output of protected inventions over a five-year period remains strong, Gaze said.
"If inventions aren't protected by patents, they're nothing more than good ideas," she said. "The fact that BlackBerry is on the list is evidence of its efforts to climb out of its current state of affairs and its continued investment in new technologies to try to gain a competitive edge."
London, Ont.-based tech analyst Carmi Levy agreed that sales of mobile devices to "teenagers at the mall" only tell part of the story.
"There's a certain amount of misconception in the market about the current worth of BlackBerry as a technology innovator," he said, noting the brand has "taken a beating" in the smartphone space against iOS and Android devices.
In a bid to turn its fortunes around, Levy noted, BlackBerry's strategy has wisely refocused on the enterprise market and away from developing mass consumer products.
For companies that want to employ mobile services while keeping them secure and well managed, the BlackBerry platform is still considered the "gold standard," Levy said. "This is a company that, almost from the moment that it was founded, has always had success based on its ability to innovate.
"Research and development has been core to the organization for its entire history. Last year, some suitors [looking to buy the company] were kicking the tires, specifically looking at BlackBerry as a repository of IP."
Reuters analysts parsed four principal criteria in determining which 100 companies would make the cut for the 2014 Global Innovators list:
• Overall patent volume.
• Success rate of patents.
• Global reach of the portfolio.
• Influence of a company's patents, as evidenced by citations.
The 2014 Global Innovators collectively generated $3.69 trillion (U.S.) in revenue last year.
Since John Chen took the reigns as BlackBerry's CEO a year ago, the company's shares have risen by 58 per cent to $10.25.
In September, BlackBerry released its Passport phone, boasting a 4.5-inch screen and a wider shape.
Although Levy said some consumers would view the device as "radically different," with its dual-purpose trackpad keyboard and novel design, what he finds more interesting is inroads the company is making in back-end development, with products such as version 12 of its BlackBerry Enterprise Server software.
"The company recognizes that even though it no longer sells BlackBerry handhelds in the same volume that it once did, there's huge business out there in managing everyone else's devices, too," Levy said. "At the end of the day, BlackBerry must be judged by more than just its handheld sales, and its inclusion on this list helps move it toward that future."
BlackBerry holds more than 44,000 patents, according to chief operating officer Marty Beard.
"It's an honour to be representing Canada on the list of top 100 Global Innovators, knowing all the innovation that is happening across the country including right here in our backyard in the Waterloo Region," Beard wrote in an email.
As for other emerging Canadian innovators, Levy foresees a possible "next BlackBerry" in Waterloo's Sandvine technologies or at Thalmic Labs, maker of the Myo, a gesture-control armband that uses muscle activity to operate digital devices.
"Just because BlackBerry had a bad few years doesn't mean the Canadian tech sector isn't capable of creating another BlackBerry in the future," Levy said. "The seeds for that very promising future have not only already been planted, they're already starting to bear fruit."
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