2012.08.03
The Telegraph is reporting that RIM is planning to license out its new BB10 operating system to other hardware manufacturers when it's launched. This is taking lead from Android and it's bid in trying to make the company relevant again.
Thorsten Heins, CEO, explained that RIM's future could lie not in producing handsets but by supplying a software platform to the customers that still want it.
"We don't have the economy of scale to compete against the guys who crank out 60 handsets a year. We have to differentiate and have a focused platform. To deliver BB10 we may need to look at licensing it to someone who can do this at a way better cost proposition than I can do it. There's different options we could do that we're currently investigating.
"You could think about us building a reference system, and then basically licensing that reference design, have others build the hardware around it – either it's a BlackBerry or it's something else being built on the BlackBerry platform."
"You could think about us building a reference system, and then basically licensing that reference design, have others build the hardware around it – either it's a BlackBerry or it's something else being built on the BlackBerry platform."
Licensing out BB10 is probably just one idea, from a range that Heins and co are considering, for now. The licensing won't be free unlike how Google does with Android. But will hardware manufacturers be interested in working with BB10 in the first place?
