Trends Hut

Citing unnamed sources, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that the so-called BlackPad could be unveiled as early next week at a developer's conference in San Francisco. The actual device is expected to become available in the fourth quarter, the Journal said.

A RIM spokesperson told USA TODAY that it does not comment on rumors and speculation.

RIM has been losing ground in the smartphone arena that has been its traditional stronghold. Researcher Gartner predicts that phones running the BlackBerry operating system will account for 11.7% of the worldwide market by 2014, down from 17.5% this year.....

A tablet PC may provide RIM with a lift. But the competition -- mainly from Apple's iPad -- is fierce. It's "a market that RIM has no exposure or experience in," says Sameet Kanade, an analyst with Northern Securities in Toronto.

Tablets are a hot market, says tech analyst Tim Bajarin of Creative Strategies. "If you're a smartphone vendor today the natural way to continue to growing your business would be to introduce a tablet," he says. "In that context I believe it's quite necessary for RIM to deliver (one) as a competitor to Apple, and for that matter Microsoft."

What RIM has going for it is a powerful brand name and stellar reputation. But it's not certain whether BlackPad would be targeted more toward a mass market, or the business base in which RIM earned its chops. Either way, RIM doesn't have the ecosystem of developers that Apple has put together.

RIM's shares closed at 47.63 Wednesday, up 1%. Analyst Kanade believes if such a rumored product happened a few years ago, RIM's stock price would go up around 5%. "This is no longer 2006 or 2007 where RIM is being treated like a darling," he said.