Key to BlackBerry 10 is in the details says RIM COO
For Kristian Tear, the key to RIM’ssalvation lies in the details.
When RIM chief executive Thorsten Heins approached the longtime telecom industry executive earlier this year about Research In Motion as its chief operating officer, Mr. Tear was excited about the prospect of being part of the team that would begin writing a new chapter for the Waterloo, Ont. company.
On Monday, RIM moved one step closer to putting pen to paper on that new chapter when the company announced it would hold a press event on Jan. 30, 2013 to launch BlackBerry 10, and its first new smartphones in more than a year.
But there are details left to be ironed out before the company’s first two devices to run on BlackBerry 10 are ready to make their public debut and work their way into the hands of anxious BlackBerry fans, according to Mr. Tear.
“There are a lot of details, and the devils are in the details,” Mr. Tear said in an interview. “We have a good plan, and it’s a plan built for success and we govern that plan very thoroughly. We have war rooms where we follow up on details. It is going to be about the details, and we’re paying a lot of attention to the details.”
As RIM’s COO, overseeing everything from operational functions for handhelds and services to research and development and manufacturing and supply chain, getting BlackBerry 10 out the door and into the hands of customers is Mr. Tear’s singular focus right now.
“It’s like in Formula One [racing], you can have the best car, you can have the best driver, but if the wheel mount is not coming on and off when you have a pit stop, it doesn’t really matter,” Mr. Tear said in an interview.
“You need to have the best wheel mount on-and-off man as well. So I am driving my team and making them very conscious of this. That it is in the details and we are reviewing, checking and putting actions in place to make sure that it will be very good.”
