RIM's Q3 conference call was another train wreck last night. Sure, they hit their reduced guidance numbers (updated December 2nd). Sure, they were profitable and managed to grow their subscriber base. But the bad news just keeps stacking up.

I've paid attention to the feedback from the other articles I've written at CrackBerry, and I know people value a balanced opinion. So I'd like to talk about the good and the bad.

Let's start with the bad ... because I think it's horribly unacceptable, and it far outweighs the good. And I have a feeling this post will be a bit longer than I planned, and I want to make sure the heavy stuff is up front.

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Press Release

Research In Motion Offers Free Premium Apps to Customers Following Service Interruptions

Waterloo, ON - Research In Motion (RIM) (NASDAQ: RIMM; TSX: RIM) announced today that a selection of premium apps worth a total value of more than US $100 will be offered free of charge to subscribers as an expression of appreciation for their patience during the recent service disruptions. The apps will be made available to customers over the coming weeks on BlackBerry® App World™ and will continue to be available until December 31, 2011.*

“Our global network supports the communications needs of more than 70 million customers,” said RIM Co-CEO Mike Lazaridis. “We truly appreciate and value our relationship with our customers.  We’ve worked hard to earn their trust over the past 12 years, and we’re committed to providing the high standard of reliability they expect, today and in the future.”

The complete selection of premium apps will become available to download at BlackBerry App World over a period of four weeks beginning Wednesday, October 19th.  The selections over this period will include the following (with more to come):

• SIMS 3 - Electronic Arts
• Bejeweled - Electronic Arts
• N.O.V.A. - Gameloft
• Texas Hold’em Poker 2 - Gameloft
• Bubble Bash 2 - Gameloft
• Photo Editor Ultimate - Ice Cold Apps
• DriveSafe.ly Pro - iSpeech.org
• iSpeech Translator Pro - iSpeech.org
• Drive Safe.ly Enterprise - iSpeech.org
• Nobex Radio™ Premium - Nobex
• Shazam Encore - Shazam
• Vlingo Plus: Virtual Assistant - Vlingo

RIM’s enterprise customers will also be offered one month of free Technical Support.  Current customers will be offered a complimentary one month extension of their existing Technical Support contract, and customers who do not currently have a Technical Support contract will be offered a one month trial of RIM’s BlackBerry Technical Support Services - Enhanced Support, free of charge.  Additional details about the program and information about how to register will be available at www.blackberry.com/enterpriseoffer.

“We are grateful to our loyal BlackBerry customers for their patience,” added Lazaridis. “We have apologized to our customers and we will work tirelessly to restore their confidence.  We are taking immediate and aggressive steps to help prevent something like this from happening again.

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To All BlackBerry Customers:

I want to first apologize for the service interruptions and delays many of you have been experiencing this week. I also wanted to connect with you directly, give you an update on the service issues we are trying to solve, and answer some of the questions and concerns you’ve expressed.

You’ve depended on us for reliable, real-time communications, and right now we’re letting you down. We are taking this very seriously and have people around the world working around the clock to address this situation. We believe we understand why this happened and we are working to restore normal service levels in all markets as quickly as we can.

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Update: The call ended with no real answers as to when BlackBerry services will be back up and running. RIM didn't really give any answers that we didn't already know, however they did explain a bit more of exactly what is going on and what caused the issues. Have a listen to the call in the player above or visit the link on the Research In Motion website.

RIM is holding a conference call at 3pm EST to discuss the recent outage in service being reported worldwide. If you'd like to tune in to listen, you can do so at the link below, and we'll follow up for those of you that can't make it live.

Join the BlackBerry Service Update Press Conference

If you haven't discovered it yet, Research In Motion is posting updates on the status of BlackBerry service at RIM.com (and on UK.BlackBerry.com). Here's the timeline and where things are at:

Wednesday 12th October - 9:45 (GMT-5)
BlackBerry subscribers in the Americas may be experiencing intermittent service delays this morning. We are working to resolve the situation as quickly as possible and we apologize to our customers for any inconvenience. We will provide a further update as soon as more information is available.

Wednesday 12th October - 12:00 (GMT+1)
We know that many of you are still experiencing service problems. The resolution of this service issue is our Number One priority right now and we are working night and day to restore all BlackBerry services to normal levels. We will continue to keep this page updated.

Tuesday 11th October - 21:30 (GMT+1)
The messaging and browsing delays that some of you are still experiencing were caused by a core switch failure within RIM's infrastructure. Although the system is designed to failover to a back-up switch, the failover did not function as previously tested. As a result, a large backlog of data was generated and we are now working to clear that backlog and restore normal service as quickly as possible. We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused to many of you and we will continue to keep you informed.

Tuesday 11th October - 16:00 (GMT+1)
Some of you are experiencing messaging and browsing delays. We are working to restore normal service as quickly as possible and we apologise for any inconvenience this has caused.

Monday 10th October - 20:46 (GMT+1)
Our sincere apologies to all of you affected by today's BlackBerry service issues.

Monday 10th October - 15:00 (GMT+1)
We are currently working to resolve an issue impacting some of our BlackBerry customers in the Europe, Middle East and Africa region. In the meantime, we apologise to you for any inconvenience, and thank you for your patience.

Tonight RIM posted Q2 financial results that disappointed investors enough to send the stock tumbling close to 20% in after-hours trading. Since I covered the stock as an analyst in the financial community dating back to 2000, Kevin asked me to share my perspective on the results with CrackBerry Nation. So here goes.

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This just in!!  Stay tuned for our live blog starting up soon to go with the earnings call (Kicks off at 5pm ET). See the full press release on MarketWire. Watching RIMM stock on Google Finance, in the early minutes the after hours trading has the stock down some 12% as I type this. Will see if the slide continues.

Press Release

Research In Motion Reports Second Quarter Fiscal 2012 Results 

WATERLOO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - Sept. 15, 2011) - Research In Motion Limited (RIM) (NASDAQ:RIMM)(TSX:RIM), a world leader in the mobile communications market, today reported second quarter results for the three months ended August 27, 2011 (all figures in U.S. dollars and U.S. GAAP, except where otherwise indicated).

Highlights:

• Revenue in the second quarter was $4.2 billion and service revenue surpassed $1 billion for the first time
• GAAP net income of $329 million or $0.63 per fully diluted share; adjusted net income of $419 million or $0.80 per fully diluted share
• The BlackBerry subscriber base grew 40% year over year to surpass 70 million
• RIM's largest roll-out of BlackBerry smartphones was initiated with 7 new smartphones launched with over 90 carrier and distribution partners in 30 countries during the latter part of Q2
• Approximately $780 million was invested as part of a consortium of companies that successfully bid to acquire intellectual property assets from Nortel
• BlackBerry smartphone shipments in Q3 are estimated to grow between 27-37% over Q2 shipments

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Research In Motion announced via a press release today that it plans to launch the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet in an additional 16 markets around the world over the next 30 days.

The BlackBerry PlayBook is scheduled to launch in the following countries:

This is definitely great news for those you of living outside of North America who have waiting to get your hands on RIM's first tablet. The wait is almost over!

Following up on the news earlier this week that Research In Motion is under investigation for possible federal securities law violations, RIM fired off a press release this morning saying the purported class action lawsuit is without merit:

WATERLOO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - May 27, 2011) - Research In Motion Limited ("RIM") (NASDAQ:RIMM)(TSX:RIM) today confirmed it intends to vigorously defend against a purported class action lawsuit filed against the Company and certain of its officers in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. The lawsuit alleges that during the period from December 16, 2010 through April 28, 2011, the Company and certain of its officers made materially false and misleading statements regarding the Company's financial condition and business prospects, and seeks unspecified damages on behalf of an alleged class of purchasers of the Company's common shares during this period. RIM believes that the allegations are without merit. 

The investigative and potential class action lawsuit efforts here are being conducted by law firm Holzer Holzer & Fistel who have a history in this sort of racket (they went after Palm too prior to them being acquired by HP). Personally having listened to all the investor calls and keeping pretty close tabs on the state of BlackBerry, I think this is a bunch of BS. But I'm sure for people who took a bit hit on the stock they'll see it the other way. It'll be interesting to see how this one plays out. 

In the meantime, since it's Friday and I dislike having to post on this kind of BlackBerry hateration on the blogs, check out the video above from the I Love My BlackBerry contest we ran a while back to brighten things up. This one is called Scent of a BlackBerry, which shows just how far some people will go for their beloved smartphone. 

Following up unofficial word yesterday via a Staples memo that Research In Motion would be recalling over 900 BlackBerry PlayBook tablets, I reached out to RIM for more information seeing as the memo didn't disclose any explanation of exactly what was faulty in the units. Here's the deal: 

RIM determined that approximately one thousand BlackBerry PlayBook tablets (16 GB) were shipped with an OS build that may result in the devices being unable to properly load software upon initial set-up.

The majority of the affected devices are still in the distribution channel and haven't reached customers. RIM is working to replace the affected devices.

In the small number of cases where a customer received a PlayBook that is unable to properly load software upon initial set-up, they can contact RIM for assistance. 

So that's that. Not a big deal. Nothing to really be worried about in the grand scheme of things and not many consumers should actually be affected by the issue. You can check our original post for the serial numbers of recalled units. And as always, if you have a PlayBook and are experiencing any issues, just jump into our BlackBerry PlayBook forum for some awesome help from our friendly community.

At the close of the markets today RIM fired off a press release letting investors know they've adjusted their forecasted revenue down from the guidance provided last quarter. The drop is due to less phone sales than expected, with a bigger portion of the sales mix coming from lower end phones than expected. The press release is below to read, but if you're by the computer at 5:30pm EDT you can jump on the live webcast to hear RIM talk about the numbers (I'm curious to see if they have anything to say about the PlayBook launch). 

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Here's the press and release and numbers we've been waiting for. You can read the full press release below to get a look at RIM's 4th Quarter and 2011 Year End Fiscal results (I know, I know, it's weird they're working so far into the future and not on the calendar year). We'll report back with more analysis once we read through it and see what the after hours trading does.

Press Release

Research In Motion Reports Year-End and Fourth Quarter Results for Fiscal 2011

WATERLOO, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - March 24, 2011) - Research In Motion Limited (RIM) (NASDAQ:RIMM)(TSX:RIM), a world leader in the mobile communications market, today reported fourth quarter results for the three months and fiscal year ended February 26, 2011 (all figures in U.S. dollars and U.S. GAAP).

Highlights:

• Record BlackBerry® smartphone shipments of 52.3 million grew 43% over fiscal 2010
• Fiscal 2011 revenue grew 33% over fiscal 2010 to $19.9 billion and earnings per share grew 47% over the prior fiscal year to $6.34 per share diluted
• Ongoing investment in PlayBook and QNX-based platform development in Q1 with PlayBook launch date of April 19th
• BlackBerry was the number one selling smartphone brand in the United States1, Canada1, Latin America1 and the UK2 for calendar 2010

Q4 and Fiscal 2011 Results: Revenue for the fiscal year ended February 26, 2011 was $19.9 billion, up 33% from $15 billion last year. Revenue for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2011 was $5.6 billion, up 1% from $5.5 billion in the previous quarter and up 36% from $4.1 billion in the same quarter of last year. The revenue breakdown for the quarter was approximately 81% for devices, 16% for service, and 3% for software and other revenue. During the quarter, RIM shipped approximately 14.9 million BlackBerry smartphones for a total of 52.3 million smartphones in fiscal 2011.

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Wow. RIM has wasted no time in squashing the rumor that popped up the other day about rumored poor battery performance on the upcoming BlackBerry PlayBook. So says RIM:

"Any testing or observation of battery life to date by anyone outside of RIM would have been performed using pre-beta units that were built without power management implemented. RIM is on track with its schedule to optimize the BlackBerry PlayBook's battery life and looks forward to providing customers with a professional grade tablet that offers superior performance with comparable battery life." 

The original story/rumor traces back to Kaufman Brothers analyst Shawn Wu who claimed the battery life wasn't yet up to par with the Samsung Galaxy Tab or Apple iPad, which could see the launch of the PlayBook delayed until May. Looks like this isn't the case (I actually held off on blogging that original story as I didn't think it was an accurate statement and to be honest have way more faith in my sources than Wu's). Awesome to see RIM put this out there just like that. They obviously have a lot riding on the PlayBook and new QNX-based BlackBerry Tablet OS. So far everything about both the hardware and software has been really positive, so I'm glad they killed this negativity immediately.  

PlayBook Release Date Update: As for the release date of the BlackBerry PlayBook, which is the big question on everyone's mind right now, hopefully we'll learn more next week at CES in Las Vegas. CES is the biggest electronics show of the year, and CrackBerry will be there reporting back the news. We've already seen the PlayBook show up at Developer sessions, so we're hoping to see it next week in Vegas for ourselves finally. RIM promised first calendar quarter delivery, which gives them until the end of March to deliver it without being late. Personally, I'm *hoping* RIM will kick off the marketing efforts for the BlackBerry PlayBook with a half-time commercial at the Super Bowl.  Think about it... Black Eyed Peas are the half-time act (RIM loves the BEP), and football is all about having a playbook. It would be the perfect place to start advertising. The Super Bowl this year is February 6th, which is coming up fast. If I'm right on this theory, RIM would have to start actually selling the device not too long after the advertising starts. Worst case, by end of March, but hopefully sooner. All I know is that if April 1st hits and I don't own my own PlayBook, I'm gonna be pi$$ed!

Research In Motion quietly announced some BIG news this morning via a blog post by RIM's CTO, David Yach. They have acquired tat - The Astonishing Tribe - which as David says:

Today we are pleased to confirm plans for The Astonishing Tribe (TAT) team to join Research In Motion (RIM). We're excited that the TAT team will be joining RIM and bringing their talent to the BlackBerry PlayBook and smartphone platforms. 

For those who don't know, TAT is renowned for their innovative mobile user interface (UI) designs and has a long history of working with mobile and embedded technology. TAT focuses on delivering great user experiences, from a design, technology, and usability perspective. Their design technology is used today in a variety of industries including the consumer electronics and automotive sectors. Examples of TAT's UI designs and concepts can be viewed on their web site at www.tat.se.  

Man oh man, you gotta love the way RIM goes about its acquisitions. With acquisitions like Torch, QNX, and now tat, RIM is really pulling in all the pieces it needs to ensure BlackBerry will be fighting for a long time to come in the smartphone space. I'm sure tat has already been working on some RIM projects (PlayBook) prior to becoming part of RIM, but lets hope they go to work quick so you can see and use a little of tat's kick ass UI talent on your next BlackBerry in the (hopefully) near future.