ParisLemon

Peter Kafka reporting on new RIM CEO Thorsten Heins’ call with analysts this morning:

And the new tech that the company has in the pipeline — a revised version of its PlayBook tablet, and a new operating system due out in the fall — are great. You’ll see: “I don’t think there is a drastic change needed.”

RIM is still awash in revenue, so there is undoubtedly push-back to really shaking stuff up. But this sure sounds like RIM’s new CEO fails to see the writing on the wall, just as his predecessors clearly did.

And that shouldn’t be surprising. As Kafka notes, Heins has been RIM’s COO for the past four years. He’s the guy former co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis were grooming to take their place one day. That day came sooner than they expected, but all parties seem to be failing to acknowledge why.

RIM needs to quit dicking around with the PlayBook and focus on either what they’re good at (enterprise-focused smartphones) or something entirely new that blows away the market the way the first BlackBerrys did. To be honest, they should probably be doing both if they want to exist in 5 years. 

The most troubling thing Heins said today:

Q: Please go into detail: What are your priorities for the next 100 days?

Heins: We need to get better at market communications.

Yeah, that’s the ticket.