Embattled Canadian smartphone and tablet maker RIM (Research In Motion) has reported its Q2 fiscal results, with revenue for the second quarter of the firm’s fiscal 2013 coming to $2.9 billion (R23.85 billion). This is a quarterly increase of 2%, but a 31% decrease compared to revenue of $4.2 billion (R34.54) during the same period last year. The revenue breakdown for the quarter was approximately 60% for hardware, 35% for services rendered and 5% for software as well as other revenue.

RIM shipped around 7.4 million BlackBerry smartphones and about 130 000 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets during the quarter. This is a far cry from the 35.1 million iPhones and 17 million iPads that Apple managed to sell during its most recent financial term (fiscal Q2 2012). During the past quarter RIM also managed to grow the BlackBerry subscriber-base to approximately 80 million users around the globe.

It is however closer to Nokia’s figure of 10.2 million smartphones sold during its Q2 2012 fiscal term, with RIM president and CEO Thorsten Heins stating this week during BlackBerry Jam Americas that BlackBerry 10 will provide the firm with a great chance to claim the coveted number three smartphone platform position (ahead of Windows Phone OS) behind Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS.  

The company posted a net loss of $235 million (R1.95 billion) for its fiscal Q2, which is not as bad as the $518 million net loss reported for its fiscal Q1 2013.

RIM’s future outlook

Over the next quarter the company plans to invest in targeted marketing and sales programmes in order to aggressively drive sales of its BlackBerry 7 OS powered smartphones, before the anticipated launch of its new BlackBerry 10-based handsets in Q1 2013.

RIM again expects to report an operating loss during its fiscal Q3 2013 as it completes company restructuring operations and readies itself for the transition to BlackBerry 10.

“Despite the significant changes we are implementing across the organisation, our second quarter results demonstrate that RIM is progressing on its financial and operational commitments during this major transition,” stated Heins.

“Subscribers grew to approximately 80 million global users, revenue grew sequentially from the first quarter, cash, cash equivalents, short-term and long-term investments increased by approximately $100 million to $2.3 billion, and carriers and developers are responding well to previews of our upcoming BlackBerry 10 platform. Make no mistake about it, we understand that we have much more work to do, but we are making the organisational changes to drive improvements across the company, our employees are committed and motivated, and BlackBerry 10 is on track to launch in the first calendar quarter of 2013.”

In related news, RIM’s BlackBerry Buddies, a dedicated team of people tasked with assisting users in making their RIM devices more efficient and advising customers of the latest BlackBerry developments, recently provided BlackBerry users with the following useful tips to get the most out of their device’s battery life.