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BlackBerry bosses quit in smartphone shake-up

The bosses of BlackBerry developers Research in Motion (RIM) have quite amid pressure from investors.

Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie resigned as the firm continued to lose market share to the Apple iPhone, as well as growing competition from Android-powered handsets.

Thorsten Heins, the chief operating officer, has now been named president and chief executive of the firm.

A statement from Mr Lazaridis issued on Sunday read: “There comes a time in the growth of every successful company when the founders recognise the need to pass the baton to new leadership.”

He added that the company needed a new leader to take it into a new phase.

RIM was once one of the leading players in the smartphone market, managing to capture the attention of the business market, as well as consumers and younger people. However, many of their recent endeavours have fallen flat.

The RIM PlayBook tablet, for example, was a commercial failure as consumers deemed the Apple iPad to be more desirable. As a result of this and other business problems, including an email outage, the company has seen its shares fall by almost three quarters of their value over the past year.