BlackBerry Plans to go Private in a $4.7 Billion Deal

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BlackBerry plans to become a private company in a deal that is worth just $4.7 billion.

BlackBerry's largest shareholder, Canadian insurance company Fairfax Financial, hopes to buy the smartphone maker for $9 per share.
The proposed deal comes just three days after BlackBerry announced a preliminary quarterly financial report, which included a $1 billion loss for last quarter and plans to lay off about 4,500 staff.
This gives Fairfax, which already owns about a 10% stake in BlackBerry, an opportunity to buy out the rests of the shares. Fairfax CEO Prem Watsa said the deal "will open an exciting new private chapter for BlackBerry," and that it will "deliver immediate value to shareholders."
However the Fairfax offer is not a done deal as BlackBerry chairperson, Barbara Stymiest said the company would consider "superior" deals, and that it has until Nov. 4 to find a better offer before proposing Fairfax's plan to shareholders.
If BlackBerry does receive multiple offers, a bidding war could break out. Late Friday, theNew York Times posted a report saying BlackBerry co-founder and former co-CEO Mike Lazaridis had approached private-equity firms about making an offer for the company.
If the Fairfax deal goes through, it will likely be a big relief for BlackBerry -- and a big challenge for Fairfax to satisfy the world growing demand for Smartphone, and the numerous Blackberry consumers worldwide.
Meanwhile, BlackBerry rivals Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500), Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) and Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) have worked hard to improve their security and e-mail delivery capabilities. As a result, corporate IT departments have opened their once-restrictive gates to non-BlackBerry devices.

Blackberry 10, the operating system that was meant to save the company, was delayed several times.  Although BlackBerry 10 was finally launched in January, its sales were sorely disappointing majorly because of the platform. 

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