RIM CEO Thorsten Heins says “Nothing Wrong” With Struggling Company

RIM has been described by observers of the tech industry as a crumbling tech has-been. However, its freshman CEO says that there’s really nothing wrong with the company as it is now.

Heins – who was named the Canadian smartphones- and tablet-maker’s CEO in January – was on air with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp’s Metro Morning radio show recently and he said that:

“This company is not ignoring the world out there, nor is it in a death spiral. There’s nothing wrong with the company as it exists right now. I’m not talking about the company as I, kind of, took it over six months ago. I’m talking about the company (in the) state it’s in right now.”

That’s a pretty bold statement to make if you’re the CEO of a company which has posted disappointing performance quarter after quarter for years now. In fact, the performance of RIM for its latest reported quarter – the first quarter of 2012 – seems to say that the company is certainly on a death spiral.

RIM has just recently announced a loss of $518 million for Q1 2012. That is the company’s first net loss in the last eight years. This is compared to a $695 million net profit in Q1 2011. The loss of $0.37 per share for the quarter comes even though the company tallied a revenue of $2.8 billion.

It also announced that it is firing 5,000 people from its employee population of 16,500. The struggling Canadian company also announced yet another delay to its next-generation BlackBerry 10 OS. As a result, smartphones running on the system – the very smartphones RIM’s survival is depending on – will also be delayed to next year.

The RIM CEO believes that the company he has taken over is in what is called a “transition” stage. “Yes, it is very, very challenged at the moment — specifically in the U.S. market. The way I would describe it: we’re in the middle of a transition,” Heins said.

However, he remained confident about the future of RIM. “I’m positive we will emerge successfully from that transition,” he said.

In the tech industry today, there are two giants who seem to be on their knees. Those are RIM and Nokia. We’ve also heard this “transition” line from Nokia and the reassurances that its senior management believe they’ll make it through.

What do you think about RIM CEO Thorsten Heins’ statements? Tell us in the comments below.

Source: Reuters

Image from Official BlackBerry Images on Flickr (CC)

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