Research in Motion may be getting shopped around to other tech companies including Samsung or looking to license its OS, according to recent reports. Citing its "trusted sources," Boy Genius Report says that RIM may be looking to sell either some of its divisions or the whole company, though it may be overvaluing what it has to offer.
RIM has had its share of difficulties over the last few years, from price reductions on its PlayBook tablet and delays for its BlackBerry 10 operating system to a service outage and plummeting smartphone market share. Now Jim Balsillie, co-CEO of RIM, is apparently shopping RIM to companies that may interested in purchasing RIM for some of its still-strong features.
According to BGR, one of RIM's selling points is its BlackBerry Messenger system, something that might help a company like HTC or Samsung in differentiating themselves from other Android smartphone manufacturers. RIM's enterprise services are another potentially salable part of the company.
But RIM may not be preparing to sell the company in full: on January 4, Barron's quoted an analyst from Jefferies and Co. as saying that RIM had agreed to license its BlackBerry OS to "Samsung, HTC, and possibly others."
Whether the company is trying to sell or prop itself up via licensing, it's reportedly attaching a a big price tag. According to BGR, RIM wants over $10 billion, and likely as much as $12 billion to $15 billion, for a full sale.
RIM did not respond immediately to requests for comment, and Samsung tells Ars it "does not have information to share at this time."