Blackberry 2002 Annual Report Download - page 6

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Excluding a write-down of raw materials inventory, product and services gross margins in fiscal 2002 were
in line with prior years. We expect gross margin to continue to be strong in fiscal year 2003 due to the
growing proportion of revenues from services and software as well as manufacturing and product efficiencies.
RIM continues to be well financed with approximately $645 million in cash and equivalents at year-end.
We believe that our balance sheet will provide us with the necessary resources to continue our growth
and execute on our corporate strategy.
BLACKBERRY
BlackBerry is the core revenue-driver of RIM’s business and continues to be recognized as the corporate
standard for wireless data communications in North America across a wide range of industries and
government agencies.
This year marks the launch of RIM’s integrated solution for wireless data and
voice applications. RIM introduced the BlackBerry 5810™for North America
and the BlackBerry 5820™for Europe and Asia, as well as the BlackBerry
Java Development Environment (JDE) to facilitate the development of third-
party applications for BlackBerry.
Fiscal 2002 has also been significant in terms of establishing new carrier relationships. In North America
we announced partnerships for GSM/GPRS with VoiceStream Wireless Corporation, AT&T Wireless and
Rogers AT&T Wireless. We also announced a partnership with Nextel Communications, Inc. for iDEN®
.
New European relationships include Telecom Italia Mobile (TIM) in Italy, T-Mobile in Germany and
Vodafone in the UK. We also announced our first Asian carrier partnership with Hutchison Telecom
in Hong Kong and a partnership with Telstra in Australia. Cingular Wireless and Motient Corporation
in the United States and Bell Mobility in Canada also continue to be important partners for RIM.
This year, RIM completed the realignment of its direct sales efforts to a focus
on carrier sales and marketing support in order to drive BlackBerry demand
through our carrier relationships. In the coming year, we expect to continue
these efforts in order to facilitate successful BlackBerry launches with our
partners around the world.
RESEARCH IN MOTION LIMITED 2002 ANNUAL REPORT
4