There are more twists and turns to the BlackBerry saga than a 99-cent romance novel, but one thing you can expect to stick around is the company's handset business.
Speaking with Reuters, interim CEO John Chen said there are no plans to shutter the loss-making smartphone side of BlackBerry's racket.
He added that BlackBerry has resources to pull a 180.
"I know we have enough ingredients to build a long-term sustainable business," he told Reuters. "I have done this before and seen the same movie before."
Phone it in
Chen, who is replacing Thorsten Heins, didn't elaborate on what kind of phones BlackBerry would keep making. The company said in September it is ditching consumer handsets and instead focusing on enterprise and "prosumer-centric targeted devices."
It also said it would cut its phone portfolio from six to four.
Flush with $1 billion (about £62m, AU$1.05b) in fresh investor funding, BlackBerry could use some of that money to rebuild its smartphones business. One place it won't find its way is to certain executive salaries, as Chen plans to shake up BlackBerry's upper ranks by bringing in new members and promoting others from within.
Chen said he expects a turnaround to take at least six quarters. We wish him luck, but the old CEO promised a turnaround too, and now he's out of a job.
Source : techradar[dot]com
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