By Carla Mozee, MarketWatch
LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — Investors pulled shares of Research In Motion Ltd. lower Thursday evening, with the BlackBerry smartphone maker’s quarterly results and shipments coming in below expectations.
Research In Motion RIMM +0.44% CA:RIM +0.22% shares fell 9% as they came off a trading halt, and were recently down 2.8% at $13.34. The company said fourth-quarter adjusted earnings were 80 cents a share and revenue fell 25% to $4.19 billion. Analysts polled by FactSet Research were expecting earnings of 81 cents a share on revenue of $4.54 billion.
TORONTO (AP) -- Struggling BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Ltd. said Thursday that it will cede most consumer markets after failing to compete with flashier touch-screen phones such as Apple's iPhone and models that run Google's Android software.
Instead, RIM said it will return to its roots and focus on business customers, many of whom prefer BlackBerrys for their security. RIM has had limited success trying to enter consumer markets in recent years, and RIM CEO Thorsten Heins said a turnaround required "substantial change."
"We plan to refocus on the enterprise business and capitalize on our leading position in this segment," Heins said. "We believe that BlackBerry cannot succeed if we tried to be everybody's darling and all things to all people. Therefore, we plan to build on our strength."
It was fun to ride the RIMM roller coaster up the hill way back when. It would go up, split, go up more, split and it seemed like a never-ending train. I do believe it's mostly downhill from now. The Apple train has left RIMM at the station.
Balsillie resigns; BlackBerry giving up on the consumer market
TORONTO - Struggling BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Ltd. said Thursday that it will cede most consumer markets after failing to compete with flashier touch-screen phones such as Apple's iPhone and models that run Google's Android software.
Instead, RIM said it will return to its roots and focus on business customers, many of whom prefer BlackBerrys for their security. RIM has had limited success trying to enter consumer markets in recent years, and RIM CEO Thorsten Heins said a turnaround required "substantial change."
"We plan to refocus on the enterprise business and capitalize on our leading position in this segment," Heins said. "We believe that BlackBerry cannot succeed if we tried to be everybody's darling and all things to all people. Therefore, we plan to build on our strength."
Also Thursday, RIM said former co-CEO Jim Balsillie has resigned from its board. David Yach, chief technology officer for software, and Jim Rowan, chief operating officer for global operations, also are leaving in a management shakeup.
The Canadian company long dominated the corporate smartphone market and has sought to expand its appeal to consumers, but it has had trouble with consumers because the phones aren't perceived to be as sexy as its chief competitors.
BlackBerrys are known for their security and reliability as email devices, but they haven't kept pace with iPhones or Android phones when it comes to running third-party applications.
