250 workers axed at BlackBerry

Some 250 BlackBerry employees working at the company's testing facility in Waterloo were laid off on Tuesday and the news was confirmed by the manufacturer on Wednesday. Those let go had been working at the new products testing area, working on manufacturing and R&D. The company said that it had to let the 250 go in order to correctly scale for what it called "new opportunities". BlackBerry also said that the deed will improve the efficiency of the company. Last year, BlackBerry gave 5000 workers a pink slip as it started the transition to its new BlackBerry 10 OS and the new phones that go along with it, with the goal of saving $1 billion in overhead.

Earlier this month, BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins asked his stockholders to be patient as the company continues to roll out new BlackBerry 10 models. The company is expected to launch the BlackBerry A10 in November. The device has been described as being the most powerful 'Berry ever. Leaked pictures and specs have revealed a 5 inch screen with 720 x 1280 resolution, a dual-core 1.7GHz processor, 2GB of RAM and 16GB of native storage. An 8MP snapper is expected on the back of the unit.

Earlier this month Heins told stockholders, "We are still in the midst of a major, complex transition of this company, and like most of these transformations ... progress can be volatile." With that in mind, we could see some more pruning of the employee roster by BlackBerry before the year is out.

source: CTVNews via MobileSyrup