Balsillie on RIM Q1: “Fiscal 2012 has gotten off to a challenging start”, revenue down

RIM has been through a great deal of negativity over the past few months. Analysts and reviewers have been hammering down on their first entrance into the tablet market with the BlackBerry PlayBook, stating that it was not ready for market. Early estimations were that the PlayBook sold about 50,000 units in the first day, 250,000 for the quarter. When it comes to BlackBerry devices, many have leaked online (new Torch, Storm, Curve), but only the new Bold Touch 9900 has officially been announced. The 9900 is expected to be widely available later this summer. Although in Canada BlackBerry holds 42% market share, the general public and some shareholders are questioning RIM’s future in the mobile space.

RIM announced their Q1 Fiscal 2012 earnings today and the trend followed. Revenue was $4.9 billion, down 12% from the previous quarter (but an increase of 16% the same quarter of last year). RIM shipped approximately 13.2 million BlackBerry devices and approximately 500,000 BlackBerry Playbook tablets.

Jim Balsillie, Co-CEO at Research In Motion said “Fiscal 2012 has gotten off to a challenging start. The slowdown we saw in the first quarter is continuing into Q2, and delays in new product introductions into the very late part of August is leading to a lower than expected outlook in the second quarter. RIM’s business is profitable and remains solid overall with growing market share in numerous markets around the world and a strong balance sheet with almost $3 billion in cash. We believe that with the new products scheduled for launch in the next few months and realigning our cost structure, RIM will see strong profit growth in the latter part of fiscal 2012.”

Ouch. Better bring those new devices on quickly. Some good news is that the PlayBook tablet is selling OK with “approximately” 500,000 units.

Source: MarketWire