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RIM Q3 results: Ships 14.1 million BlackBerry smartphones, and approximately 150,000 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets
Waterloo-based Research In Motion has reported their Q3 Fiscal 2012 Results . It was known that they would miss their targets and today the official numbers have been announced. Echoing what they announced a couple weeks back the company shipped 14.1 million, which is up 33% from Q2 (10.6 million), plus also shipped 150,000 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets. In addition, RIM reported revenues of $5.2 billion (up 24% from last quarter of $4.2 billion). The total worldwide subscriber base has increased 35% from last year to 75 million.
So this now takes total BlackBerry smartphone shipments to 37.9 million units (13.2 million in Q1, 10.6 million in Q2, and 14.1 million Q3). RIM noted in their press release that they expect to ship “between 11 million and 12 million units”. As for the PlayBook, RIM’s tablet has amassed numbers of 850,000 (Q1 had 500,000, Q2 had 200,000, and 150,000 in Q3)
Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis, Co-CEOs at Research In Motion, said “Despite the challenges faced in the third quarter, the BlackBerry subscriber base grew to almost 75 million customers around the world. In addition, RIM launched a range of new BlackBerry 7 based smartphones globally and introduced holiday promotions that helped drive growth in the installed base of BlackBerry PlayBook users… As part of our commitment to improving our performance to better meet the expectations of shareholders and customers, we continue to evaluate ways to improve in several areas of the Company’s operations. It may take some time to realize the benefits of these efforts and the platform transition that we are undertaking, but we continue to believe that RIM has the right set of strengths and capabilities to maintain a leading role in the mobile communications industry.”
Update: On the conference call Jim Balsillie stated that he and Lazaridis will have their salary reduced to $1/year.
Update #2: RIM says that BlackBerry 10 (BBX) devices will come “in latter part of calender 2012″, will be dual-core and LTE. Audio will be up shortly.
Source: MarketWire
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32 comments for “RIM Q3 results: Ships 14.1 million BlackBerry smartphones, and approximately 150,000 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets”
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That statement pretty much means BlackBerry OS 10 will either make or break RIM come this time next year.
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not dead yet then…
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It truly amazes me to hear the talk about RIM. Somehow this Billion dollar company is dead!
No wonder people lose their shirts in the markets. No brains!
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Yeah, just like people were saying Nortel was dead! Oh, wait…
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“75 million customers” should count for something! Don’t call them dead yet.
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Back in July a RIM employee published an open letter that pretty much summed up where the executives made errors in judgement and how in spite of knowing this, failed to rework their strategies. It’s really a shame but they themselves should really be shouldering the blame.
http://www.bgr.com/2011/06/30/open-letter-to-blackberry-bosses-senior-rim-exec-tells-all-as-company-crumbles-around-him/
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“Back in July a RIM employee published an open letter”
Well, more specifically, someone *claiming* to be an executive at RIM wrote that letter. I can write a letter and say “anonymous RIM exec” on it too. Doesn’t mean it actually was.
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Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
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@ IT’SME & dieRIMdie. Can you both make a better company then what RIM is offering? BIS / BES & the best keyboard on a smartphone to date? If not then get out of here. They have almost 75 MILLION costumers. That to me sounds like 75 MILLION costumers like there RIM phone. I really doubt RIM is dying with 75 million costumers on their backs… Blackberry 10 will help them if they make a phone without the trackpad & just full touchscreen & with a keyboard..
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BB is now the underdog. C’mon, have a great comeback! If the new devices are good (at least on par with current high-end phones) I will ditch my GN for you!
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Sales are up, but net income before income taxes is down to $330 million this quarter, versus $414 million in Q2 and $1.2 billion in Q3 last year. Gross margin tanked to 27% this quarter from 43% same quarter last year.
The increase in sales is coming with significantly lower margins, which doesn’t bode well for their future (expected high end, high margin) products
They’re still making money, so it’s not all bad, but if that net income starts dropping below zero, they will have issues.
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So their sales are up 33% and revenue is up 24% and you guys think they are dying?
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I’m hoping the new OS is excellent, and it comes to WIND. Then I can ditch my Android and current wireless company. Get the new phone with infinite everything. I got high hopes.
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Jim will be able to afford a Touchpad by 2112; just be patient.
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Sorry for all the “RIM-is-not-dying” hope out there, but the reasoning is that in 2006, RIM owned 37% of the smartphone market share and now owns barely 10%.
Two years ago you would have told me Windows Mobile was still relevant because it had 15% of market share? It now has 5%, and that’s combined with Windows Phone.
Look, RIM is undoubtedly in a downfall, and if they can’t reverse the pattern, they are going to disappear at the hands of Android and iOS which are seeing tremendous growth.
It’s very clear that unless you are capable of building an ecosystem that rivals that of Android’s and iOS’s, your platform is gonna die, and there is no indication whatsoever that RIM is capable of doing this right now. Heck, it’s even doubtful whether Windows will survive the transition to the tablet/superphone generation because in order to do so, they have to replace their entire ecosystem while Android’s and iOS’s continue to grow.
It’s a bit ridiculous at this point to think RIM is going to survive this in one piece. I own a PlayBook, owned a BlackBerry before, and I wish they would survive, but in a platforms market, technology transitions are where companies go to die.
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your reasoning is flawed.. market share dropping is perfectly normal in a new market. RIM once owned 100% of the smartphone market because they developed the first smartphone but as that market grows, and new players come to the table market share will drop.
Lets take this for example.. you open a sandwich shop.. its the only one in your town.. you sell $100,000 dollars worth of sandwiches per year.. this is 100% of the sandwich market in your town.. your doing pretty well.. Next year subway opens a store down the street.. they launch a HUGE marketing campaign and more people start eating sandwhiches.. they sell $300,000 dollars worth of sandwiches, and you sell $150,000 dollars worth next year.. guess what, your market share dropped 50%.. but your still doing pretty well for yourself, your making more money then last year..the only reason your market share is down is because people are eating more sandwiches.. no harm.. no foul..
RIM is doing just fine..
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Love comments like yours. It clearly shows your how your talking out of your a*s! Since when did RIM have only 10 % of the market share? Go back and check your research, then come back here and you can admit to this forum how you were blowing smoke out of your a*s and that you have no clue what you are even talking about! Now run along and go play in the sandbox!
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“but the reasoning is that in 2006, RIM owned 37% of the smartphone market share and now owns barely 10%.”
That’s one way of looking at it. The other way of looking at it is that they have a lot more subscribers now than 2006. I just looked it up and they had 8 million active subscribers in 2006 and 75 million reported today.
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$1 a year? That’s quite a paycut hahaha
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Is not about how much $ they make (which is a lot considering they are taking RIM to the grave) its about them not doing their job. Take them out and bring new leadership!
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RIM is gonna do just fine! I think all the major players are going to be in for a bumpy ride. I believe the phones in 2o12 are going to knock our socks off and the competition is really gonna heat up! Doesn’t matter who you support the majority of users seem to be following apps and not the technology since there really is a small percentage of users actually push the limits and know what a phone can actually do! Once Android apps hook up with blackberry you will see things will change.
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ahahah salary of 1$ a year. theyre not saying how much they already have saved up and are getting from dividends and other sources of income. but i guess it’s to tryyyy to show that theyre trying to be modest until they get back on track!
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It’s beyond me why someone would want a company to die. What if there was only one phone provider in the entire world, could you imagine the crap they would push out, and we the consumer would have no choice but to buy it. Come on people, think before you comment.
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Maybe RIM is reverting back to their core strength and providing wireless solutions for business. Their security remains a huge strength. I think they tried for a more broadly based appeal and to move beyond their traditional market. So, it might simply mean that they are going back to doing what they do best. Just a thought.
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I hope this isn’t taken the wrong way because I am a huge RIM supporter, and love what they are doing. But in response to “going back to what they do best” and supporting business only.. that’s no longer an option. Today’s business man, myself included doesn’t want to carry two devices. I need my phone to run my business during the day, and do all the fun stuff I want after 5 o’clock.
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RIM is not the dog many would believe (or want). It has cash, customers, and profit. But, RIM is in decline. That decline may be arrested and reversed in the next year, but that is likely their last chance at surviving – tech has no mercy. Apple is not idle or content.
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“Hey Guys! We are doing great just look at these numbers. Anywho, because we are doing so well I have decided to cut my own salary to $1 a year. Don’t worry, it is what all successful CEO’s do.”
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RIM, a $7B company, 75 million users, 14.1 million phones sold,5.17B in revenue AND ONLY $300 million profit or 71% drop in profit from last Q???
You can say that they have 150 million users if you want but THE BOTTOMLINE is the profits and they are dropping!
Expect next Q to start biting into the Cash they have. It won’t last more than 1Q or 2Q at this rate and as per Lazaridis and his Calendar the new phones wont be here until “latter 2012″ I doub RIM as we know it will be there then.
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@Luc
To some extent, I agree with what you say. I didn’t like the idea of carrying two phones either. I admit that I have gotten rid of my BB and gone to an Android device. I can do the things that I need to for business but also enjoy some of the other functionality and apps.
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They killed themselves when they signed that deal with APPLE,MS,Sony and all.
A CEO that had vision would have JUMPED on the Android SHIP but instead they boarded the train to extinction.
Anyone who believes the hype that they are coming back are seriously delusional.
Remember folks, a supposedly smart man once said
““I will spend my last dying breath if I need to,” Jobs told his biographer, “and I will spend every penny of Apple’s $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong.”
That Steve was that WORRIED about what ANDROID was going to become should have set off a light bulb at RIM , instead they did a stupid move and tried to join forces and take them out.
DUMB & DUMBER
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Here you go R I M .
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-01/nortel-sells-patent-portfolio-for-4-5-billion-to-group.html
Remember this well because this was the stupidest ,dumbest,decision you ever made.
Maybe APPLE and MS will help you ?
LOL not likely!!!!
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[...] quarterly results have revealed that the BlackBerry PlayBook has racked up shipments of 850,000 (Q1 had 500,000, Q2 had 200,000, and 150,000 in Q3). Sure, below analysts expectations, but the [...]
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