[ChiefEngineer]

BlackBerry had BBM on their legacy devices and it didn't stop the original iPhone from being a hit. BlackBerry released their BB10 devices in January 2013 with BBM that were very competitive, and objectively better than the iPhone at the time, and it did not stop the iPhone. Then BlackBerry released BBM on Android and iPhone allowing cross-platform communication with objectively the best messenger available at the time. It failed.

The success of the iPhone was built on the culture of iPhone-first app development and the unwillingness of companies to develop for a third platform.

[Workaccount2]

Android was much more competitive with iPhone back then, as social circles hadn't yet solidified around one platform. Google was also still widely praised back then as an innovative leader. BB had lost enormous market share by 2012, it was too late.

All google had to do was make an iMessage clone, probably even could have made a better service back then, and make it the default on all android phones. Suddenly Google would have had a powerhouse feature for the main thing phones were used for in 2012: communication.

But instead Google decided to leave SMS default and instead toy around with their stupid a/b model that nobody ended up using anyway.