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BlackBerry drops three million users in three months, ships a million Z10s

BlackBerry drops three million users in three months, ships a million Z10s

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$94 million profit from $2.7 billion revenue

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BlackBerry 10 stock
BlackBerry 10 stock

In its first earnings report since changing its name from RIM and releasing its next-generation operating system, BlackBerry has posted a small operating profit of $94 million from $2.7 billion revenue. Analyst estimates had BlackBerry generating anything between $2.4-3.2 billion. That's encouraging news for the Canadian manufacturer — last quarter it made only $14 million.

Less encouraging is the news that BlackBerry lost three million subscribers over the quarter — down to 76 million worldwide from 79 million in Q3 and 80 million in Q4. It says it sold six million BlackBerry devices over the past three months, but only a million of them were running BlackBerry 10. It's worth noting that BlackBerry's Q4 2013 ended on March 2nd, 2013. That means these figures don't reflect the US and Canadian launches of the company's new flagship smartphone, the Z10. Analysts expected a total of 6.95 million sales, 1.1 million of them BlackBerry 10 devices, so it's fair to say the company fell a little short, at least based on Wall Street's optimistic expectations.

Update: During a call for investors following the announce of BlackBerry's financial report, CEO Thorsten Heins clarified some of the figures that were in the release. According to Heins, most of the three million subscriber losses can be attributed to prepaid devices, though he didn't say exactly how many. He also noted that two-thirds to three-quarters of the one million Z10s that shipped have sold through the end users, and reiterated the company's plans to bring the QWERTY Q10 smartphone to market in April.