BlackBerry has reported revenue of USD 1.6 billion for the second quarter ending 31 August, down 49 percent from USD 3.1 billion in Q1 and down 45 percent from USD 2.9 billion in the year-earlier quarter. The revenue breakdown for the quarter was around 49 percent for hardware, 46 percent for service and 5 percent for software and other revenue. In the second quarter, BlackBerry recognised hardware revenue on around 3.7 million smartphones. Most of the units recognised are BlackBerry 7 devices, part because certain BlackBerry 10 devices that were shipped in Q2 will not be recognized until those devices are sold through to end customers. During the quarter, around 5.9 million BlackBerry smartphones were sold through to end customers.
The GAAP loss from continuing operations for the quarter was USD 965 million, including a primarily non-cash, pre-tax charge against inventory and supply commitments of around USD 934 million (the Z10 Inventory Charge"), and pre-tax restructuring charges of around USD 72 million related to the Cost Optimisation and Resource Efficiency (CORE) programme. This is compared with a GAAP loss from continuing operations of USD 84 million in Q1 and GAAP loss from continuing operations of USD 229 million in the same quarter last year. The adjusted loss from continuing operations for the second quarter was USD 248 million, or USD 0.47 per share diluted.
President and CEO Thorsten Heins said it was very disappointed with the operational and financial results for the quarter and had announced a series of major changes to address competitive hardware environment and cost structure. He highlighted the increasing penetration of BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES 10), where it now has more than 25,000 commercial and test servers installed to date, up from 19,000 in July 2013. He added that BlackBerry remained a financially strong company with USD 2.6 billion in cash and no debt.
