RIM Q2 results: investors savvy, shares rise

Shares of BlackBerry maker Research In Motion were up 11% in early trading Friday after the company late Thursday posted Q2 results that beat Wall Street expectations.

For its fiscal second quarter ended Sept. 1, the smartphone maker reported revenue of $2.9 billion, above consensus estimates of $2.5 billion of analysts polled by Thomson Reuters. Revenue fell 30% from the year-earlier quarter, but that was an improvement from the 43% drop in Q1, the media report says.

RIM said it lost 27 cents per share minus items, but analysts had expected a 46-cent loss. RIM shipped 7.4 million BlackBerrys, better than expectations of 6 million to 6.5 million, and its number of subscribers rose to 80 million from 78 million in the prior quarter.

For its November quarter, RIM did not provide specific guidance but said it expects another operating loss. Analysts project a loss of 39 cents a share, vs. a profit of $1.27 in the year-ago quarter. Revenue is seen falling 54% to $2.35 billion.

RIM is scheduled to ship its new BlackBerry10 operating system early next year, missing out on holiday sales.

“BlackBerry10 is on track to ship in the (calendar) first quarter, but profitability remains unclear,” wrote Shaw Wu, an analyst with Sterne Agee, in a research report Friday. He’s not sure the new OS can effectively compete against Apple, Google Android phones and phones running Microsoft’s Windows mobile operating system.

“We maintain our neutral rating as we continue to be concerned with its fundamentals, where competitive pressures from Apple and Google are unlikely to subside,” Wu wrote. “The company faces a major product transition with its new operating system.”

Wrote William Blair analyst Anil Doradla in a research note Friday: “Based on management’s commentary on the earnings call, nothing led us to be incrementally positive, and we continue to believe that the company’s structural challenges persist.”

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Posted by Usman Khalid on Sep 29 2012. Filed under Sci-Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.