BlackBerry PlayBook 16GB placed on the “to be discontinued” list

At last count RIM reported BlackBerry PlayBook shipments reached 700,000 in 6 months. This number is certainly not up to par with all the other tablets that saturated the market in the last year, but RIM always stated the PlayBook is the “world’s first professional-grade tablet”. The price points of all models recently received a price drop, which was well accepted, but owners are still waiting for native email, calendar and contacts to appear. The last rumour was from Bloomberg’s sources who pegged a September availability for these features.

The good news is that RIM is “highly committed to the tablet market” and will be releasing new versions of the PlayBook, most notably a 4G LTE PlayBook that should drop sometime “during the second half of 2011” (time is quickly running out). We’ve been given word that the 16GB version has been placed on the “to be discontinued” list. The screenshot is from TELUS and the doc shows the final date of returns is on November 8th and the last day to place orders is on October 10th. Finally, the date the PlayBook will no longer be available is currently blank, most likely will be that way until stock reduces. Bottom line, the 16GB is being discontinued and no indication of the 32GB or 64GB models.

(Thanks tipster!)