Investors Eye Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ:RIMM) BB10 Launch

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Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ:RIMM) (TSE:RIM)’s BlackBerry 10 launch is the focus of investors and shareholders as we get ready to close out 2012. Analysts at Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) don’t believe RIM will become “a viable 3rd mobile OS,” although they do expect the company to remain strong into the launch of the BB10.

Investors Eye Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ:RIMM) BB10 Launch

According to Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS), they expect results from the company’s third fiscal quarter to remain weak because Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ:RIMM) (TSE:RIM) will be reducing its inventory of BlackBerry 6 and BlackBerry 7 handsets. However they don’t see those results having a major impact on the company as a whole.

They also say that management could decide to start charging users for BlackBerry Mobile and similar services in order to “leverage RIM’s strength” and “continue to generate services revenue.” Analysts note that even if the company’s 60 million BlackBerry Mobile subscribers paid $2 per month, it would still only replace a third of the company’s service revenue.

Analysts at Morgan Stanley expect service revenues to continue falling going forward as the company renegotiates agreements with carriers “in exchange for BB10 marketing support.” Reports have indicated that the BB10 will not use the network infrastructure in the same way as similar devices.

Morgan Stanley analysts ran checks of RIM’s supply chain for the BlackBerry 10, and they said they expect that RIM will sell up to a million of the devices this quarter and 3 million devices in the first quarter of 2013. They are maintaining their Underweight rating on shares of RIM and setting their price target at $7 per share.

Shares of Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ:RIMM) (TSE:RIM) fell to just below $14 per share in trading today. The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:NDAQ) just announced that the company’s stock would be removed from its NASDAQ-100 Index starting Dec. 24..

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