Research In Motion has reportedly stopped production of its BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and is considering exiting the space altogether. Collins Stewart analyst John Vinh made the claims in a note to investors Thursday morning, citing anonymous sources at RIM’s manufacturing partner Quanta. “While Quanta last week acknowledged that it had laid off a significant number of production workers from a factory focused on producing the PlayBook, our research indicates that the ODM has essentially halted production of the tablet, Vinh wrote. “Additionally, our due diligence indicates that RIMM has canceled development of additional tablet projects.” The move would be drastic, but hardly unforeseen; RIM shipped 500,000 PlayBook tablets in the slate’s launch quarter, and only 200,000 more during its first full quarter of availability. Multiple analysts have anticipated the PlayBook’s demise, and it appears as though they may have been right. RIM launched its BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on April 19th of this year.
UPDATE: A RIM spokesperson dismissed Vinh’s report and supplied BGR with an official statement, which can be found here, via email.
