Research in Motion changes its name; it's now officially BlackBerry

During today's BlackBerry 10 press event in New York City, Research in Motion's CEO Thorten Heins made the surprise announcement that the company was changing its name to BlackBerry and will use the stock symbol BBRY. He stated, "We have reinvented the company, and we want to represent this in our brand."

This is a huge change for a company that's been around since 1984. However, it's certainly a welcome one. Research in Motion, also known as RIM, needed to ditch the name to the far more familiar BlackBerry as a symbol of its plans to go forward with the new BlackBerry 10 operating system and its two new devices.

This is not the first time that a big tech company has changed its name. Apple Computer turned into just Apple in 2007. However, changing Research in Motion to BlackBerry is a far more radical change. Basically, it's as if Microsoft decided to call itself Windows from now on, or if Google changed its name to Android.

In any event, it will certainly be easier to write about the company from now on. This will be a move that will be highly supported by both consumers and businesses.