Troubled Canadian Smartphone maker, BlackBerry®, is set to be acquired by Fairfax Financial for $4.7 billion a deal that will see the company go private.
BlackBerry® Limited announced in an official statement that it had “signed a letter of intent agreement under which a consortium to be led by Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited has offered to acquire the company subject to due diligence”.
If the deal goes through, Fairfax, currently the largest shareholder in the phone maker company with 10 percent shareholding, will offer a buying price of $9 per share to the shareholders. This is however subject to BlackBerry® conducting a 6 weeks due diligence period in which they will “actively solicit, receive, evaluate and potentially enter into negotiations” with other potential buyers.
The acquisition offer comes a few days after the company announced 4,500 job cuts internationally in a bid to cut loses. The company has also projected that it is expecting to make a loss of up to $1 billion after its new handsets performed dismally in sales.
BlackBerry® was introduced back in 1999, going ahead to revolutionize the mobile industry, growing steadily to a valuation of $80 billion in 2008.
