Beleaguered RIM’s sixth-biggest investor ‘on the way out’

“Research In Motion Ltd. (RIM)’s sixth- biggest investor said it has sold over half its holdings in the BlackBerry smartphone maker as the company loses market share to rivals such as Apple Inc.,” Jonathan Erlichman and Hugo Miller report for Bloomberg.

“‘We are on the way out. The stake has been reduced by more than 50% or even more,’ Stephen Jarislowsky, chairman of Jarislowsky Fraser Ltd., said today in an interview,” Erlichman and Hugo Miller report. “‘They are resting on their laurels,’ Jarislowsky said. ‘Steve Jobs is a much better marketer than RIM,’ he said, referring to Apple’s chief executive officer.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Steve Jobs is much better than DCW RIM at everything except resting on laurels, selling antiques, and clueless blank stares.

Related articles:
Beleaguered RIM misses on revenue, announces layoffs – June 16, 2011
O2 rejects RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook; won’t sell in UK due to end user issues – June 16, 2011
Even RIM doesn’t want their Playbook tablet – June 9, 2011
RIM half-CEO’s biggest fear comes to fruition: Apple unveils iMessage app and service – June 6, 2011
As RIM flounders, investors talk of replacing half-CEOs – May 31, 2011

20 Comments

    1. Actually, there is not much at all what Jobs does as “marketer”: like five-six public appearances/announces in year and that is it.

      No additional interviews, no press conferences, no road-shows, no exhibition showcases, no nothing.

      And advertisement budget that is twice lesser than that of Microsoft (to which we should add HP’s, Dell’s, Samsung’s et cetera budgets).

    2. Marketing and Advertising/Promotion are often conflated. Marketing is the tough part. It is the identifying potential products manufacture and people to sell them to. It’s where you put your money where your mouth is and direct the company’s future. In this respect Steve Jobs is the greatest marketer of our times. That’s why the Gretzski quote of “skating to where the puck WILL be” is so often applied to Jobs.

      1. Amen. Too often people use the word marketing in place of hucksterism. True marketing is hard but extremely rewarding. Marketing involves doing some deep thinking to figure out what business you are really in, what is your product really good for, and how can you monetize your efforts.

  1. Folks – think of Marketer in MUCH broader terms. Meaning, what should we sell (or not), to whom should we sell it and at what price – so on and so forth.

    NOT just how do we advertise it.

  2. “Steve Jobs is a much better marketer than RIM, Jarislowsky said.

    What a stupid statement. Apple makes much better products than RIM, period. Even Steve Jobs can’t market a turd to phenomenal sales. Just look at Ping.

  3. Their RIMM holding was probably huge, and as such they must have been selling for the last few months while sending out their pump-and-dump tools like Abramsky and moronic bloggers like Andy Zacky to hype RIMM valuation to sucker in small investors to buy their shares.

  4. If he was a good investor, he would see Steve Jobs and Apple for what they really are: innovative, forward thinking, a company that elevates R&D and customer needs, an ability to enter markets with products that not only ‘just work’ but fill a need even where others have failed.

  5. From the original article:
    “Balsillie has tried unsuccessfully to bring U.S.-based National Hockey League franchises to Canada in recent years. He also is the founder of the Balsillie School of International Affairs and chairman of the Centre for International Governance Innovation, both in Waterloo.”
    So one of the co-CEOs would rather screw up pro sports and international diplomacy? No wonder RIM is totally clueless!

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