Katie Marsal
RIM is expected to decide whether to work with a band in the next few days, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing four people familiar with the matter. They indicated that RIM would prefer an agreement to license its smartphone software, while its secondary choice would be a strategic outside investment in the company.
With those options allegedly strong possibilities for the company, one drastic option that is reportedly not on the table is a sale of the company. One source was said to have indicated that executives at RIM have no plans to sell.
RIM is said to be considering hiring one Canadian bank and one global bank to help it come to a decision.
If RIM decides to license its patents, which are considered to be the company's most valuable assets, both Microsoft and Samsung would be interested in such a deal, Tuesday's report claimed. Microsoft, however, would be unlikely to make a strategic investment in RIM, the report said.
While those options are available, executives at RIM would rather find a way to license its forthcoming BlackBerry 10 operating system, which is scheduled to launch later this year. As such, officials at RIM are focused on finding a bank that can best advise them on forging a licensing deal for BlackBerry 10.
Shares of RIM have slid 75 percent over the last year as the company has failed to adequately respond to the success of Apple's iPhone and handsets running the Google Android mobile operating system. The company reported dismal earnings late last month as three major executives, including co-founder Jim Balsillie, left the company, after reporting quarterly results so poor that the RIM had to publicly clarify it did not plan to pull out of the consumer sector.
Earlier this month, RIM lost two more top executives, and the company revealed it was weighing its strategic options. Future changes for the company could include a shift from hardware to software and services.
RIM is now even being outperformed in its home country of Canada, as for the first time ever Apple's iPhone surpassed the BlackBerry in 2011. RIM shipped 2.08 million BlackBerrys last year in Canada, while Apple shipped 2.85 million iPhones.
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
AppleInsider Staff
Chip Loder
Malcolm Owen
16 Comments
oh oh ...
The beginning of the end ...
here's an idea... get someone to write a Blackberry app that says randomly while they are working at blackberry to quote the late Steve jobs "This is Shit"... (if you have read the Steve Jobs book by Walter Isaacson you'll know what i mean )
the problem with blackberry is the fact that they are stuck in Quick sand... and anymove makes them sink further... so even a "lifeguard" (new CEO) throws a "life preserver" into the quick sand, it will also sink too... thus the "new CEO" needs to get a crane and pull "blackberry" out of the quicksand... (perhaps QNX is that crane...)
but will the crane be on solid ground?, or will it too be engulfed in the mire?...
so stop with the license BS... make the BLACKBERRY run 4 times longer, and i assume that their existing customers will be happy and they will be a slimmer happier company... otherwise slash and burn so that RIM can run on half the subscriber base that it has now...
RIM: "What should we do?!"
Financial Adviser: "Stick your head between your legs and kiss your a$$ goodbye. That'll be $1,000,000."
RIM continues to slide into irrelevance. There is no saving RIM. Horrible phones, horrible OS, and horrible management.
RIM continues to slide into irrelevance. There is no saving RIM. Horrible phones, horrible OS, and horrible management.
The key now becomes saving the good patents, working ideas, and people they have left in there.
For Apple, securing rights to the tech and patents behind BBM, at least, looks like it should be key.
Because then all the business users left in the lurch by the death of their company can just pop on over to Apple and use iMessage.