Unsold BlackBerry Playbooks will cost RIM $485 million
Surplus stock of the under-performing BlackBerry PlayBook will cost RIM somewhere in the region of $485 million (£308 million), the company has today revealed.
Despite a number of price cuts, the feldgling RIM tablet is still sticking steadfastly to store shelves, with consumers opting for Apple or Android rivals instead.
That’s not to say RIM aren’t still hopeful that the tablet will meet its potential in the new year.
“RIM is committed to the BlackBerry PlayBook and believes the tablet market is still in its infancy,” said Lazaridis.
“Although a number of factors have led to the need for an inventory provision in the third quarter, we believe the PlayBook, which will be further enhanced with the upcoming PlayBook OS 2.0 software, is a compelling tablet for consumers that also offers unique security and manageability features for the enterprise.”
That PlayBook OS 2.0 software that Lazaridis mentioned is pencilled in for a February release. However, despite the continued requests from the small PlayBook using community, the update still wont bring with it native BlackBerry Messenger support.
Which is symptomactic of the PlayBook’s failure thus-far in fact. Though not an awful piece of hardware by any means, the PlayBook suffered from key functionality being notably absent at launch. 9 months later, we’re still waiting for the likes of BBM to hit the platform.
With such a lacklustre response to this first tablet offering, and RIM’s financial woes this year well documented, it makes you wonder whether they’ll bother release a PlayBook 2 at all.
Via: RIM
