Breaking: BlackBerry considering sale as 'strategic alternative'

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

After some murmurings last week that Waterloo, ON based BlackBerry was looking to go private in order to better restructure the company as it struggles to regain its foothold in mobile smartphone market it once pioneered, news today of more aggressive measures including the sale of the company are being explored.

BlackBerry says its board has launched a formal review of "strategic alternatives" to fix the ailing company and among these alternatives is the sale as a whole or in part of the company. The end result of the review could be BlackBerry forming joint ventures, strategic partnerships or a sale of BlackBerry. In other words, all offers are on the table.

BlackBerry attempted to make a comeback this year with the year-late launch of its BlackBerry OS 10 devices and operating systemr. The company launched three new smartphones but sales haven't been stellar and the company continues to struggle in a highly competitive mobile economy ruled by Apple and Samsung.

“As the Special Committee focuses on exploring alternatives, we will be continuing with our strategy of reducing cost, driving efficiency and accelerating the deployment of BES 10, as well as driving adoption of BlackBerry 10 smartphones, launching the multi-platform BBM social messaging service, and pursuing mobile computing opportunities by leveraging the secure and reliable BlackBerry Global Data Network,” BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins said in a statement.

For Canadians, this news is painfully reminiscent of what happened to Nortel Networks right before that company folded.  BlackBerry, then known as Research In Motion, was the most valuable stock in the Toronto Stock Exchange. Below is the full press release from BlackBerry

Click to read more ...

Breaking: Philips sells off consumer electronics business for $201 million

A report from the Wall Street Journal reveals that Philips has left consumer electronics after 80 years. The Dutch multinational just sold its entire Lifestyle Entertainment business (encompassing audio, video, multimedia and accessories) to Japanese conglomerate Funai Electric Co. Philips was unable to compete with the low cost Asian manufacturers in the industry and was also impacted by the move from physical media to digital files for audio and video.

"Our consumer lifestyle business was margin dilutive to the group, so it was time to decide to move away from consumer electronics,” said Frans van Houten, Philips’s chief executive.

“Since we have online entertainment, people do not buy Blu-ray and DVD players anymore,” Mr. Van Houten added. Philips will continue its other industrial businesses as well as in lighting products where it is considered one of the leading companies.

Source: WSJ