RIM acquires mobile software company Viigo

Viigo’s president and Chief Executive Officer Mark Ruddock wrote in the blog posting that, "Our team has joined RIM's global organization and will continue to bring our expertise in BlackBerry application development and real-time content delivery to the BlackBerry platform."

No other details regarding the acquisition have been provided by either RIM or Viigo.

The web posting also mentioned that Viigo will continue bringing its “expertise in BlackBerry application development and real-time content delivery to the BlackBerry platform.”

Viigo delivers syndicated content such as news, politics, weather, sports etc to cell phone in easy to read format.

Acquiring Viigo, smart move from RIM
Keeping in mind the ever increasing competition in the smartphone market, manufacturing companies try their best to offer something new and unique to lure customers to buy their devices.

Usually first thing customers want to know before buying a smartphone is about how many apps the platform offers.

According to Deepak Chopra, a tech analyst at Toronto’s Genuity Capital Markets, RIM by acquiring Viigo might be preparing to take on Apple Inc. and its brigade of application makers.

Though, it’s not the first time RIM has acquired a company solely for the purpose of competing in the mobile “app ecosystem.” In 2008 it has acquired Chalk Media Corp. that specialized in making mobile applications; for over $23-million.

"[RIM] viewed the Viigo application as strategic enough, both to the consumer and enterprise markets, that they wanted to buy it and integrate it more deeply," said Chopra.

Strong fiscal year earnings for RIM
RIM is soon going to show its fourth-quarterly fiscal earning report, and market analysts are busy predicting what the report might show.

According to MarketWatch, RIM could report improved financial results in its fourth-quarter fiscal earnings on Mar. 31. The company could announce a 24 percent revenue jump.

"Our qualitative discussions with carriers suggest that RIM is still the clear leader, with Android-based phones the platform with the most current momentum (albeit from a very low base)," said Kevin Hunt, an analyst at Hapoalim Securities.

However, some analyst believe that RIM could lose its lead to companies such as Nokia, Apple and Android phone makers as they start marking their presence felt in the highly competitive smartphone market.

As per Pierre Ferragu at Bernstein Research, "The breakthrough innovation of 10 years ago rarely makes the breakthrough innovation of today, and the company's current strategy is too centered on leveraging in today's changing environment what made Blackberry so strong in the past."