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Wednesday at its BlackBerry Jam conference in California, RIM showed off its upcoming operating system, BlackBerry 10. While many industry watchers had written off the struggling smartphone maker, the event gave many BlackBerry fans reason for optimism.
“RIM CEO Thorsten Heins took to the stage at the firm’s Jam Americas event in San Jose California yesterday to declare that the delayed BB10 can topple Windows Phone 8 and claim third place in the mobile OS rankings,” reported TechRadar. “Heins said: ‘We have a clear shot at being the number three platform on the market. We’re not just another open platform on the market, we are BlackBerry.'”
PCMag quoted Heins as saying, “We recognize the need for change. There is a new culture at RIM. There’s a fighting spirit.” He added that RIM remains “focused on the things that we do best, and that will never change, ever.”
ZDNet’s Larry Dignan wrote, “Research in Motion’s BlackBerry Jam in San Jose could either be considered the rebirth of a company or a last gasp attempt to keep developers interested in the platform. There’s not much in between.” He continued, “Watching RIM CEO Thorsten Heins talk all things BlackBerry 10, which will be tested by carriers in October, I couldn’t help but root for RIM. Yes, I realize RIM faces long odds, but we all love a comeback story and frankly I’m tired of the Apple iOS and Google Android race.”
Investors apparently also found reason to root for RIM. “Shares of Research In Motion Ltd rose on Wednesday after the struggling BlackBerry maker announced better-than-expected subscriber numbers and assured its wary investors that its new devices will go on sale in early 2013,” said a Reuters article. “Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM will announce quarterly results on Thursday and analysts were expecting the company, for the first time in its history, to have begun losing subscribers. But at a developer event on Tuesday, RIM announced that its subscriber base had grown by 2 million in the quarter that ended Sept 1.”
