CA - BlackBerry Limited (BB) Presents at JP Morgan Auto Conference (Transcript)
2023-08-12 06:11:08 ET
BlackBerry Limited (BB)
JP Morgan Auto Conference
August 9, 2023, 05:20 PM ET
Company Participants
Grant Courville - VP of Products and Strategy
Tim Foote - VP of IR
Conference Call Participants
Ryan Brinkman - JP Morgan
Presentation
Ryan Brinkman
Okay. We're going to get going with the next presentation now. I am Ryan Brinkman the Auto analyst at JPMorgan. We're very happy to have Grant Courville, the Head of Product Strategy at QNX. He's going to walk us through the story. We'll engage in some chat. I turn it over to you, Grant. Thanks so much for being here.
Grant Courville
Thank you. I like to thank the team at JPMorgan for inviting us and all of you that are here today. I know it's been a long day. So we'll spend about the next seven or eight minutes talking a bit about QNX and trends that we're seeing and whatnot, and then we'll jump right into Q&A.
My name is Grant Courville. Yes, I head up Product Strategy at QNX, I started with QNX, essentially in the late '80s. Call is still a start-up at the time and has been with QNX through the acquisitions by HARMAN International and, of course, by BlackBerry. So very exciting left for a few years to go work with the defense company to spin up their safety-certified software business and whatnot, and then came back to QNX. So I'll share a bit. We'll jump into the Q&A, and hopefully, we'll all learn a bit.
Safe Harbor statement. Mandatory. Thank you, Tim Foot for the Canadians and the crowd. Yes, you can add you to the word harbor, but I won't spend time reading this given the time that we have. So let me just jump right into it then.
Firstly, what do we provide from a BlackBerry QNX perspective? We're part of the IoT unit at BlackBerry. There's IoT and cybersecurity. So cute as part of the IoT unit. We provide foundational software. So if you think about it, think about the hardware or the silicon. We are the layer directly above that. So we are managing the hardware. We are managing the processes in the system.
We are that layer that has to work and has to work all the time reliably in the system. And that's what our customers count on us for. So we provide things like an operating system, so the conic real-time operating system, Hypervisor, which relates to virtualization technology that you're starting to hear more and more about when it comes to domain controllers. We have middleware and frameworks for ADAS controllers and whatnot, communication software.
And what we've done with our software, which is different than what you might see elsewhere, is we've safety certified our software to the highest levels across multiple segments. So ISO-26262 for automotive safety, 6150 for industrial safety, 623 of course medical, and of course, is the rail safety standards. There's also emerging standards and ratified standards in automotive now for cybersecurity. So think of ISO-21434 and WP 29, much longer conversation. But essentially, they are industry standards now that you can aim for and get assessed to.
We've been certifying our software for well over a decade. Very difficult to do, big investment, but it's an investment we chose to do many years ago and continue to invest in.
In terms of our foundational software, think about, again, middleware and applications sit on top of what we deliver. What you're seeing in automotive is obviously more of an adoption of software, and you'll hear the term software-defined vehicle and whatnot. And what we're seeing in the vehicle is more systems in the car that can actually run our software, moving from little microcontrollers to more complex systems to systems that are making use of 32-bit and 64-bit processors. So essentially, there's more systems in the car with more complexity that we can run on. And these are an example of some of those that you see. So traditionally, many years ago, we dominated infotainment.
Today, you can look at where we're winning, which is digital cockpit, which is the dash of the car, and software in the dash of the car. ADAS systems, what you do with safety, secure gateways, for instance, and you're starting to hear about domain controllers. And we won't have time to talk a lot about that. But effectively, the message is there's more software in the vehicle, there's more systems in the car that we can run on than there used to be. And the need for safety, security, and reliability continues to grow. And again, that's been our foundation. That's been a fundamental part of our culture for decades.
In terms of the vehicle, I think -- I'm sure you've all seen various iterations of the architecture. But essentially, you've heard numbers like 100 ECUs or systems in a car, 150 ECUs in the car. Some are little microcontrollers. Some are microprocessors. Again, microcontrollers tend to be your fixed-function type systems, and your microprocessors tend to be your more complex systems. And as consumers, as we wanted more and more functionality in the vehicle, more capabilities in the vehicle, the traditional approach was at another ECU and wiring and power and whatnot to it.
What's changed, and we're just starting to see that now. Automotive, keep in mind, is very evolutionary. Nothing happens overnight, is a move towards domains. You might hear the term zonal controller. You might hear the term central compute. The net-net of it is that many of these discrete ECUs, these fixed function systems are moving now into more high-performance compute platforms. The first instantiation of the first, what you're seeing first now, is the domain controller called the cockpit domain controller.
That's a reality. That's in vehicles. We had our first cockpit win years ago. And what you're seeing there is a virtualization technology, our acoustics technology, some of our middleware we're running in the cluster just like we used to before. So software content in the dash of your car, what you're seeing now is Android, for instance, for infotainment. So that's the first place you're really seeing a domain controller in the vehicle.
From a consumer perspective, you wouldn't know if it's a domain controller if everything is consolidated or whether it's separate systems, and that's actually just fine. You want it to work and you want it to work always and reliably. Over time, you will see zonal controllers, you will see central compute. But again, this is very, very evolutionary. And we're right at the heart of it because we take pride in working very closely with our customers. We are always, always learning, and that's a big part of our success.
Some of the numbers. So we had a great year last year. I won't go over all of the numbers, but we had a record number of design wins. And if you think about the cycle in automotive, essentially, you go from the competition part of it to an award where you were granted that program or that platform. Then there's development for, say, two to three years, plus or minus, and then you hit production, which is easily five years and beyond.
So any time you see numbers related to us related to a design win, that's fuel for the future. That means we want to program our vehicle or our software will be in those vehicles as a start of production, which again about three years or so, plus or minus from design win and then for many years to come. So we focus very much on those design wins.
And of course, there was a recent number published by tech insights that says we're in 235 million vehicles on the road. So that's a number that continues to increase, so we're also very proud, and of course, multiple systems in those vehicles.
The other thing as well that we're seeing in the industry is, obviously, there's the whole movement towards electrification or electric vehicles. There's your established volume players. Essentially, electrification is an opportunity to relook at the architecture of the vehicle. We look at all of those systems in the vehicle. And what we've seen with the new entrants is that they're looking to make use of foundational software that's proven and trusted in automotive. We've been in automotive since 1998. We've worked hard to earn that trust. We will continue to work very closely with our customers and deliver the safe, secure, and reliable software that we do.
And again, customers are looking to build on top of that. They realize that the value is not necessarily foundational software, what we sometimes call undifferentiated heavy-lifting software. The marketing people don't necessarily like that. But essentially, it's that layer that has to work always safely and securely and be ultra-reliable, build on top of that. And that's the trend that we're seeing in software-defined vehicles, building customers or Tier 1s. Automakers are building that middleware, building the applications, building the connected services on top of the software that we provide.
And there you go. How am I for time? I zip through that. Normally, I speak for much longer than that, but Tim has told me to get the big hook out if I ramble on. So I promised I wouldn't do that.
Question-and-Answer Session
Q - Ryan Brinkman
Maybe a few questions, including for us, maybe software, news or whatnot. What exactly do you mean by foundational software? What does foundational software do, and what doesn't it do?
Grant Courville
So good question. If you think about a system in the vehicle or an embedded system, you'll have the silicon, whether it's from the common silicon vendors you'll find in automotive, so the Qualcomms, NXPs, TIs, Renesas, and others. Above that, it's the layer of what we call foundational software, which will typically be the real-time operating system or the operating system called QNX or virtualization software, which you might hear the term hypervisor.
It's the layer that interfaces to the hardware that manages the hardware and that makes sure all of the processes and all of the applications that the OEMs are developing and others are developing adhere to the rules that they put in place.
So we make sure that they're separated, make sure they get the priority that is needed. Essentially, the way to look at foundational software is it's absolutely critical to the operation of your system. Another way of putting it, if you think of a desktop PC running, say, Microsoft Windows, Windows is the operating system, then you have the applications on top of it. So what we provide may not be glamorous, but to us, it's software that we worked on, and we've been in critical complex systems for literally decades, but it has to work, has to work all the time.
Ryan Brinkman
Yes. We covered HARMAN before they were purchased by Samsung and they talked about QNX being used in like roller coasters or just super safety critical things that cannot fail or people will die is that essentially?
Grant Courville
Yes, exactly. And that's where…
Ryan Brinkman
A blue screen of that.
Grant Courville
We don't like that. No. So yes, we add a lot of value in safety critical systems, systems with a level of criticality, whether it's safety critical, whether it's security critical. That's where we add a lot of value. That's where we've literally spent decades. Our original history was in industrial automation, control systems, and whatnot. We're absolutely still in those markets, think robotics, think conveyor control, factory automation, process control, but the level of criticality of these systems has now entered the vehicle and it will continue to be part of the vehicle as well as the level of complexity. And what I always like to say is complexity is our friend. We know how to deal with complex systems, and we know how to help our customers deal with complex systems.
Ryan Brinkman
And what is the distinction between you got the safety critical systems. And then you've got the non-safety critical systems? And how important is it that they stay like separate from each other? And what's the key distinction between them?
Grant Courville
Good question. You might hear us use the term functional safety. And this is where you have industry standards that define functional safety. I mentioned ISO-26262 earlier, which is the functional safety standard for automotive. And there's similar functional safety standards for other segments. Essentially, a safety-critical system is one where if something goes wrong, something bad will happen. I'm speaking very simplistically but could cause harm to the people involved or the environment around you.
So think of systems. If we talk automotive just for a minute, think of systems such as lane keep assist, adaptive cruise control, lane departure warning, driver monitoring systems, and the number of safety systems in the car keeps growing, whether it's an automated system or talk autonomous, if you want, but these are systems that are there today to assist the driver, to assist in the safe operation of the vehicle. So that would, say, be a characteristic of the safety critical systems in the vehicle.
Non-safety critical systems in the vehicle could be something like, for instance, maybe your infotainment system. That does not have a safety requirement. It's not -- it doesn't impact the safe operation of the vehicle. So from a QNX perspective, what we've done is we take our software development tools and our operating system and our hypervisor, and we deliver safety-critical versions of that software and development tools and non-safety-critical certified versions of that software.
Now what we've done from a product strategy perspective, which is very different than what you'll see out there from others, is that we use -- it's a common operating system with common interfaces to the operating system and common development tools.
So in other words, we take our standard operating system with all of the APIs or a non-safety-certified operating system with all of the programming interfaces and development tools, and we bring that through the safety certification process. And why that's really important is if we think of where the automakers are going is everybody is trying to adopt a platform approach. I'll use the word platforming, for instance. In other words, have common foundational software across the vehicle.
Well, the best way to do that is to make sure that the software, the foundational software you're using, and the development tools you're using can be common whether it's a safety-critical environment or a non-safety-critical environment. So by virtue of the investment we make, and that's extra overhead on us because what we do is, for instance, we'll do safety impact analysis on our non-safety certified software, just like we do on the safety certified software.
So yes, more overhead for us but a tremendous benefit for our customers because they can adopt a common platform approach, which, again, is where automotive is trying to go to and is starting to go that way, again, so they can build on that platform to provide the value to customers or cost reduction and whatnot.
Ryan Brinkman
Curious like who your key competitors are? I think it's clear that like Apple CarPlay would sit on top of you as a non-safety critical rut in Android Auto, but doesn't Android Auto also have aspirations to sort of do what you do as well? If you don't win an award, who might you lose it to?
Grant Courville
Good question. So really the way I try to characterize it is there's sort of the safety critical systems in the vehicle and there's the non-safety critical systems in the vehicle. And in the safety-critical side, if there's any degree of complexity we typically win. Back to my complexity is our friend, and we've been dealing with that for many, many years.
So we typically win in safety-critical environments where there's a level of complexity in the vehicle and elsewhere. In the non-safety systems in vehicles, for instance, that will pretty much CS or Linux. But generally what you'll see, and we'll compete head-to-head with Linux and any other OSs that are out there from a non-safety critical perspective.
And again, where we can provide added value is that platform approach, safety to non-safety. And the other thing I should mention as well, in case you didn't notice, we made an announcement in May about our QNX operating system. And the focus on QNX is to keep all the goodness of the architecture that we have, which is a microkernel architecture and whatnot, but with a laser focus on performance and scalability.
Because if you think about where automotive is going and even beyond automotive, they're looking to adopt more high-performance multi-core systems, whether it's 16 cores, 32 core, and so on. What we've done is, for the last few years, kept it very quiet, but we've been doing a lot of research and prototyping of our microkernel, and we made some surgical changes to the microkernel such that it will be the most performant OS we've ever released. It will scale almost 1 to 1 with the number of cores in the system, and that's exactly what our customers are looking for. That's what our silicon partners that we work very closely with are looking for. That will allow us to go head-to-head with anybody on these high-performance systems.
Ryan Brinkman
Maybe you could describe what's meant by Hypervisor. I'm just trying -- it's been a while, but I think HARMAN used to talk about the ability to run a safety-critical and a non-safety-critical maybe on some of the same so-called multi-domain controllers or hardware because they're able to segregate it via some sort of a software hypervisor.
Grant Courville
I don't know what any of this means.
Ryan Brinkman
Really, I was going to say you've done your homework.
Grant Courville
I just remember. And that's a really key point. So we have virtualization technology. You'll hear the term hypervisor. And again, think of it as a foundational layer and what the hypervisor can do is they can actually run multiple different operating systems above it. So it could, for instance, run QNX in what's called a virtual machine. It could run a safety-certified version of QNX in a virtual machine. It could run Android in a virtual machine.
It could run Linux in a virtual machine. Where this becomes very important, and you touched on it, the notion of mix criticality. If you think of the -- actually, the digital cockpit in the vehicle, I mentioned earlier, infotainment is not a safety-critical environment. The digital instrument cluster and portions of the clusters, such as the Taltal and the Prindle for instance, and whatnot, those do have a safety requirement.
So we have a hypervisor, and you've seen many announcements about our hypervisor and the number of wins we have in the market. And with our hypervisor, we're able to have a safety certified hypervisor and segregate infotainment from non-infotainment, and non-infotainment could be your instrument cluster could be multifunction displays, for instance, and to your point, be able to support that with, say, Android running infotainment.
So we work very closely with Google to the point where we can run Google Android out of the box, binary unchanged with our hypervisor. And it's not just about the hypervisor itself, it's also about -- there's something called Verteo that it's an industry standard that allows you to share access to hardware.
At the end of the day, there's still one CPU. There might be one Ethernet controller and you need to manage the access to that in a safe way. So we brought our not only our operating system through to the highest level of certification. So ASLD is in delta for ISO-26262, we've also brought the hypervisor and certified it through -- to the highest level to ASLD as well.
We've also certified some of our shared frameworks or Verteo that I mentioned. So we recognized years ago that having critical safety-certified versions of our software is extremely important. We also recognized that extending that to the hypervisor, which is really an extension to our operating system, taking that through safety certification is also very important.
And one note on safety certification. It's not just about the software, the ones and zeros. It really is about that, yes, but also your culture and your approach to software, and the mindset, you have to always keep in mind what you're doing could have a safety-critical impact.
So very much from a culture perspective, you can't just throw software people at safety-critical software arguably any complex software, and expect a positive result. It has to be wired into your culture. And that's something, again, that we decided many years ago and continue with today. I notice was a question. I'm not sure afterward.
Unidentified Analyst
Thank you for the opportunity. Maybe two questions. First one, who actually you do is it OEMs or the Tier 1 suppliers for these systems? And secondly, when you talk about the domain controllers, how it has SBA and after is also a partner for you. How does that work? And similarly, is Mobileye also a competitor for you?
Grant Courville
Okay. Good question. So with respect to Tier 1s and OEMs, that's been a shift that we've seen in the industry. So traditionally, our direct customers were mostly the Tier 1s. And we will work very closely with the OEMs, primarily in the research teams and whatnot. I'm going back many years now. And what we've seen in the industry, the shift that we've seen occur the OEMs are investing more in software are building up their software capabilities. They realize that there's value to be had in software and connected services.
So what we've seen now is that we are effectively not only engaging with the OEMs directly, even more, that we're actually supplying to the OEMs directly, both software and services, that's contractually and whatnot. So our customers remain Tier 1s, absolutely because some systems, the OEM will pursue, I'll say, the more traditional model of working through the Tier 1s, whereas other systems, other wins that we'll have, especially when you deal with OEMs that are looking at more of a platform approach because they realize that to adopt a platform approach successfully.
It's an environment where the OEM really has to be more in control. So we work a lot more with the OEMs today than we ever have, both from an engineering perspective and a business perspective. And you've seen many announcements from many OEMs around investing more in software.
So that was the first question. The second question I'm trying to remember was SBA...
Tim Foote
Yes. SBA.
Grant Courville
So Aptiva is a customer of ours, been a longtime customer of ours. SBA is an architecture that they put forward, obviously, for the software-defined vehicle. And obviously, they can tell you a lot more about that a lot, much more about that, more so than I can. So they remain a customer. And as I mentioned, at the end of the day, their customer, our OEMs or customers, other Tier 1s or customers. And obviously, they'll all make the right decisions for the right reasons as it pertains to which foundational software they'll make use of. And Tim, I don't know if you wanted to add at all to that.
Tim Foote
No, I think that covers it. Yes. That's good.
Unidentified Analyst
[Indiscernible]
Grant Courville
So yes, so Mobileye traditionally provided a system in the vehicle, and they're adopting more of a platform approach, for instance, and whatnot. So as I said, today, Mobileye is not a customer of ours. However, who knows what the future holds, as they say.
Unidentified Analyst
Okay. First question, just to put this in context, can you tell us what percent of BlackBerry's profits you represent today and what you think you're going to represent, say, in 5 years if you've given that sort of information? And then the second question, just very simply, just to elaborate on that. So where does when River fit with what you did that you do because we hear a lot about that.
Tim Foote
Yes. Okay. So thank you for the question. So we don't actually break out the bottom line by BU. But we do give the gross margin by business unit. So QNX sits within the IoT division, business unit, and it's running in the low 80s percent, not to diminish Grant's role. But in terms of the road map, the product road map is very much informed by what the auto industry is after. So we can be quite targeted in terms of the development of our products. We work with pretty much everyone in the industry, and we're in 235 million-plus vehicles. So we can be sort of fairly lean in some of the OpEx areas as well. So by implication, I think you could derive that QNX is a fairly robust business at the bottom line, but we don't give specific numbers around.
Unidentified Analyst
[Indiscernible]
Tim Foote
Yes, we just don't break that out. It's something we could look at in the future.
Ryan Brinkman
Well, earlier in the year, didn't BlackBerry say that they were exploring the potential to separate some of their one or more of their businesses? And Grant, you mentioned you've been at QNX for like 18 years. So it was a stand-alone company is at right -- and then it was by HARMAN and then sold the blacks at the history. So it has been stand-alone. Could it be stand-alone again?
Grant Courville
We were private from 1980 to 2004 when we were acquired by the automotive division of HARMAN and then we acquired 2010 by BlackBerry. So beyond that, I'll let Mr. Foote comment.
Tim Foote
Yes. I mean, thank you for bringing up the review. I mean there's only a limited amount I can say, Ryan, in terms of a process that's ongoing. But clearly, we've got a strategy which involves top-line growth, delivering operating leverage, and producing a much stronger EPS and cash flow going forward. And we've given some outlines on how we see that.
We think we're going to achieve breakeven in the Q4 of this current fiscal. And then moving into the next fiscal year, we move into EPS positive and cash flow positive. However, we're not unaware of where the stock price is at. And ultimately, the fact that we've got two BUs in the very short term, at least, have got a different customer base, different technology set and there may be opportunities to deliver more shareholder value quicker.
So to that end, the Board and management have undertaken, they've engaged with Morgan Stanley and Perella Weinberg, and we're just exploring other opportunities at this point. We've given an outline that we expect that process to be done certainly by the end of summer. So take that to be...
Ryan Brinkman
What percentage is automotive of QNX's revenue?
Tim Foote
So broadly speaking, it's an 80-20 split. So 80 being the auto side of things and then 20 being the general embedded market. So as Grant was mentioning, like many of these safety-critical applications, they apply just as much in medical and industrial, rail. There's a whole heat. I'd say the difference being is when you get into that general embedded market, it becomes a lot more fragmented. So you get very few OEMs that are making 5 million units of anything when you move into these types of markets.
Ryan Brinkman
And is it that there's a couple of roles for QNX in the car? Is it that you're like some sort of foundational software, but then also do you get used for infotainment applications or...?
Grant Courville
For QNX is primarily the foundational software and then some, I'll call it, some middleware that builds on the foundational software. In infotainment, we're seeing a trend towards Google Android and derivatives of that. And again, we work very closely with Google to make sure that, that's all tightly integrated and supported and whatnot, again, out of the box with our hypervisor and our virtualization tech.
So that's where -- we still have systems in Infotain. We still have wins in infotainment, and we absolutely dominated infotainment years ago. And if you think about infotainment just for a minute, at that time, it was absolutely the most complex system in the vehicle, had absolutely the most software in the vehicle in a system, and absolutely the most suppliers into that system.
So again, back to what I was referencing earlier, where complexity is our friend. It's our friend because we know how to deal with it. And it took many, many, many years to develop that expertise and the processes and whatnot to deal with that. But when -- historically, when you hear the 100 million lines of code in a car, which is obviously the popular number that was advertised for many years, most of those lines of code were in the infotainment system.
And again, we were quite successful in that area. So today, it's starting to shift to the digital cockpit, and this is where you'll see Android, you'll see QNX, you'll see our acoustics, you'll see our middleware, our hypervisor, and whatnot. So you mentioned earlier, Wind River and VX work and whatnot, to be honest, we don't see that much in automotive, where we do see them, and I'm here representing IoT is we do see them in industrial and medical and other environments. And automotive, as the systems have become more complex, really don't see them much anymore.
Unidentified Analyst
In terms of your relationship with the OEMs, are you involved to the point of silicon side, like embedded -- is the relationship and the touch so embedded that you're now being involved in the silicon design as the OEMs take on that action so they can design themselves and ownership of that so...
Grant Courville
So you're using the word design, and I want to be careful how I answer the question. So we work extremely closely with the silicon vendors in automotive. It's not just about running on those platforms. It's about very tight integration, optimizing where they've added, I'll say, specific values, specific things that they've done, such as accelerators and whatnot.
So again, out of the box, you will see things like Snapdragon Ride as an example. That's pre-integrated with QNX, so an OEM receives that platform with QNX with our hypervisor and other software. It's all pre-integrated. NVIDIA Drive OS, for instance, is yet another example where QNX is integrated. So "out of the box," you will see a tight integration and optimization and ongoing road map very tightly coupled between ourselves and the silicon vendors. That's just a couple of examples. I mean, there are others, but extremely important, especially, again, as you think about the type of software that we provide. So we are in absolute lockstep with the silicon vendors.
And to your point, we work very, very closely with the OEMs. And again, we pride ourselves on staying in our lane. So we provide the expertise that we can, as I mentioned, we're always learning, but we work very closely with silicon vendors, the OEMs, the Tier 1s. So again, we can provide that enabling software for them over a long period of time.
Unidentified Analyst
Thanks for giving the time to the presentation. Just want to understand what that shift from more decentralized architecture, more of a centralized architecture. And then you've seen a couple of different executives today talk about the cards more and more becoming a phone on wheels. So can you help us think about like how fast this market is growing to roughly contextualize single digits to 20, 30, 50, how should we think about it?
Grant Courville
So I'll answer from a software architecture perspective. I mean the market numbers, there's many people that are putting out a number of market numbers out there in terms of the number of vehicles and whatnot. I'll just state, as I may have said earlier, automotive is very evolutionary. I don't lie into the hype for instance.
So again, it's a one-time two-time critical device that has to work reliably. And that now is adopting connectivity. So all of a sudden, security becomes even more important and to defend against the tax, which is why you're seeing the security standards, for instance, with some real teeth to them appear in automotive.
So definitely evolutionary. So today, you're seeing the move from traditional architecture to adopting domains, and I mentioned digital cockpit as being the first one. You're seeing consolidation of ADAS systems.
So what used to be discrete systems into a single system, which is more complex, which again is where we provide a lot of value, you'll see that evolve into, say, multiple domains, perhaps a zonal architecture, and you're seeing multiple examples of zonal architecture. And as I mentioned, then you'll see -- you'll hear the term central compute, which again is -- I won't say a step up, but even more high-performance system that you'll see in the vehicle. So very evolutionary, will take many years to occur.
And as I said, beyond -- and for us anyways, it represents even more of an opportunity. The net-net is its more systems in the car where we can run our software as the foundational elements to them. And more data in the car, which is where BlackBerry IV comes in, for instance, where it can actually work with the data, normalize the data, provide common interfaces to the data such that OEMs can now scale and build out a developer ecosystem and add value at that level as well. And that's completely above the QNX layer, the foundational software layer.
Unidentified Analyst
So you still do some infotainment and you compete against Android Auto there. But does Android Auto also have aspirations to do foundational software too?
Grant Courville
So there's Android Auto, which is essentially software that will run on your mobile phone and then there's what's called client software that runs in the vehicle. And that will run on top of QNX. We'll run on top of our hypervisor. Then there's Android Automotive OS. That runs in the vehicle, and that's where you'll see the Android stack for infotainment perhaps.
So either one of those are 100% complementary to what we do. If it's Android automotive and infotainment, that's where you'll see our hypervisor and acoustics and virtualization and whatnot. If it's Android Auto, we've supported Android Auto forever as well as CarPlay. I mean, since even before they were released.
Unidentified Analyst
Interesting.
Grant Courville
We think so. So it's pretty exciting. As I mentioned, we're in the plumbing of the vehicle and whatnot, and quite proud of it. And I've really enjoyed working with QNX. The customer's BlackBerry, I mean, it's been great. And for us, really, it's, again, more systems in the car, more software in the car and really enabling that evolution of the vehicle.
Unidentified Analyst
Why did BlackBerry purchase QNX? Was it to run the operating system for their phones? And is it critical for them for BlackBerry to own QNX, how is the relationship there?
Grant Courville
Going back a few years, to 2009, 2010, they had BBOS 7 at the time. And yes, we were absolutely acquired to be the next-generation BlackBerry operating system or BB10, for the handsets at the time for the BlackBerry playbook at the time, while at the same time, being able to serve our other markets, which obviously, we've done very successfully. So originally, yes, we were required to be that next-generation operating system, BB10. And maybe there'll be a part two to the movie, I don't know. We'll see. But yes, that was the original intense for the acquisition.
Ryan Brinkman
Okay. Great. Looks like we've run out of time. So please join me in thanking Grant and Tim.
Grant Courville
Thank you.
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BlackBerry Limited (BB) Presents at JP Morgan Auto Conference (Transcript)