Amid speculation of Canadian wireless giant Research In Motion (RIM) may discontinue its WiFi-only PlayBook tablet, the management dismissed the buzz and said the rumours are “pure fiction”.
The announcement came after shares of BlackBerry manufacturer RIM fell down to almost $25 Monday after rumours that they are planning to stop production of its WiFi-only PlayBook tablet.
BlackBerry tablet launched in April and failed to grab attention from tablet market, not even make some challenge to the leader Apple iPad. The RIM tablet sold just 500,000 units in the first six weeks of its launch, compared to one million iPads sold by Apple within the first month of its launch April 2010. The BlackBerry tablet did not go well with the users as it cannot connect to the internet over next-generation cellular network. A user cannot access email and content unless he is a BlackBerry subscriber.
In a statement RIM said, “Over the past month, the PlayBook has launched in 16 additional markets around the world and further rollouts are planned for Southeast Asia, Western Europe and the Middle East in the coming weeks.”
RIM has promised 4G PlayBooks later this summer. Apple will also come with three WiFi-only as well as WiFi-only+3G iPads.
Despite RIM’s denial market predicts that RIM will now focus more on its new line-up of BlackBerry smart phones, which to be unveiled later this year, these new smart phone will run on BlackBerry 7 Operating system. However from next year, all BlackBerry smart phones – as well as 4G tablets – will use the powerful QNX operating system.
