Research In Motion Limited (RIMM), a former heavyweight who once kept pace with Apple (AAPL), after experiencing job cuts and reconstruction, has recently been hit by the rumor of spin-off.
According to the report of a British media, RIMM is considering splitting its business into two parts, of which mobile phone manufacturing business may be sold, or get listing independently. According to speculation, Amazon (AMZN) and Facebook (FB) are the potential buyers.
Just last week, the company announced the start of a new round of job cut, of which the goal is to reduce the expenditure of $1 billion before the end of this fiscal year, but the company has not disclosed the number of layoffs.
In fact, since last year, the company has been making efforts to save itself. Five years ago, BlackBerry phone and Apple iPhone were both extremely popular in North America, and BlackBerry was known for high-end business image, even the U.S. President Barack Obama was its fan. However, under the attack of Apple and Android, Blackberry became weaker and weeker. Its proud mail push function has also been carried forward by its competitors. The company posted a net loss of $125 million for the last fiscal quarter, and revenues have declined for the fifth consecutive quarter. RIMM stock price has been hovering at the bottom.
Analysts pointed out that BlackBerry phones are losing the favor of the government and enterprises. Besides hardware devices which significantly lag behind its competitors, RIMM made lots of strategic mistakes, such as putting too much emphasis on the operating system, but ignoring the application software. At the same time, the security and stability of BlackBerry phones have been repeatedly questioned and challenged.
However, some analysis pointed out that the BlackBerry platform is still the most secure mobile platform, with a number of firm fans. A new generation of BlackBerry 10 is upcoming, and the current information indicates that the first BlackBerry 10 phone will adopt full touch screen. As there are comments saying, almost no company like RIMM which is in urgent need of a revolution.
RIMM stock price plunged 7.51%, or $0.76, to finish at $9.36 per share on Monday. RIMM stock price has lost territory of 36.76% year to date and traded below its 50 day moving average of $11.66 and 200 day moving average of $16.13.