On January 30, Research in Motion will be holding a number of press events around the world to formally announce the launch of its first BlackBerry 10 smartphones. While much of the details of those phones have already been leaked to various Internet outlets, there"s been lots of hope that the BB10 launch will boost RIM"s market share in the smartphone market.
But will RIM have to eventually sell off its hardware business in order to stay afloat? That may still be on the table, according to the company"s CEO Thorsten Heins. Reuters reports that Heins, speaking with German newspaper Die Welt earlier today, said a strategic review of RIM could show that selling off its hardware division might still be a good idea.
Another option might be to sell licensing for its BlackBerry OS to third-party makers, similar to what Google does with Android and Microsoft does for Windows Phone. However, the final decision won"t be made until after the launch of BlackBerry 10, as Heins said, "The main thing for now is to successfully introduce Blackberry 10. Then we"ll see."
RIM"s stock price has jumped way up in the days ahead of its press announcement next week. In the past two weeks, the price has gone up a whopping 35 percent.
Source: Reuters | Image via RIM