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RIM hit with class-action lawsuit from shareholders over misleading projections

By: , IntoMobile
Friday, May 27th, 2011 at 7:04 AM
BlackBerry-PlayBook-Balsill
This is the face you make when hit with a class-action lawsuit.

It looks like Research In Motion’s eternal (and sometimes baffling) optimism about BlackBerry’s future has come to bite them in the rear. Earlier this week, an Atlanta firm began investigating RIM to see if they had posted financial statements between December and April that did not disclose everything they were legally required to. As you might guess, the investigation specifically had to do with the company having trouble with “an aging product line which [was] negatively impacting RIM’s business and margins”.

In that spirit, today a New York firm has launched a class-action lawsuit against RIM on the behalf of those who had purchased stock over the time those suspect financial statements were made. RIM has said that they plan to “vigorously defend” against the claims, which is to be expected.

This isn’t the first time the maker of BlackBerry smartphones has been in hot water over their financials; a couple of years ago, co-CEO Jim Balsillie got in hot water over back-dated stock options, which resulted in some serious financial backlash. It goes without saying that the outlook for BlackBerry over the long-term is less than peachy, but if the immediate future was clearly misrepresented, this could be bad news from RIM and cast a shadow on their stock for a long time to come.

[via Canoe]

About The Author

Simon Sage

Simon Sage’s education largely surrounded writing, technology and online community, leading him to begin his blogging career at www.BlackBerryCool.com and to quickly discover a vibrant and active community surrounding BlackBerry and mobile technology. In exploring RIM’s platform, he has learned what enterprises are looking for in mobility as well as what makes the innocuous BlackBerry so appealing to them. Recently Simon’s been covering RIM’s gradual move into an already-crowded consumer market, and the impact of burgeoning challengers, such as the iPhone, as well as long-time leaders, like Nokia, on BlackBerry’s advancement. With plenty of content under his belt, Simon will be branching off a bit to see what other smartphone manufacturers are working on while still using BlackBerry as a barometer. At IntoMobile, you can count on his posts being even-handed, well-informed and thought-out.

  • Paul Kent

    The PlayBook tablet is dead in the sea. It will not beat the iPad by having the same price. RIM’s PlayBook may be as good as the the iPad but the iPad has the popularity. RIM refuses to market a tablet with a lower price, so it will not win the tablet war. The shareholders are mad with reason. Digitally Undivided

    • http://www.intomobile.com/ Simon Sage

      You don’t think the market’s big enough for more than one winner? I see this angle a lot, and it still confuses me… Just because iPad’s doing well doesn’t mean Android, BlackBerry, and others can’t carve out their own slice of the pie (however much smaller it may be than Apple’s).