BlackBerry announced last August that it had completed its latest restructuring effort and was now looking at “modest” increases in headcount going forward. While some areas of the company’s business may have indeed benefited from new hirings, at least one is again undergoing restructuring. BlackBerry confirmed on Friday that an undisclosed number of employees have been laid off from its device business.
This latest round of BlackBerry layoffs affects employees across the world. They could include the closure of BlackBerry’s office in Sweden but the company would not confirm those details. It did say that affected employees were involved in the development of smartphone software and applications. “Our intention is to reallocate resources in ways that will best enable us to capitalize on growth opportunities while driving toward sustainable profitability across all facets of our business,” BlackBerry explained in a statement.
Despite these recent layoffs, BlackBerry is not exiting the device business. It recently released a number of new models including the BlackBerry Leap and new models are scheduled to launch later this year.
BlackBerry also confirmed plans to hire more staff to ramp up its sales and marketing efforts, including establishing new partnerships.
Rumours of BlackBerry getting acquired resurfaced earlier this week with Microsoft and a number of Chinese handset manufacturers identified as interested parties.
Source : The Wall Street Journal