October 05, 2006
What The? RIM Buys Pittsburgh Penguins?
A quick clip just passed by on CNBC TV saying that Jim Balsillie, Chair of RIM, makers of the addictive BlackBerry mobile communication devices and cell phones (e.g., BlackBerry Pearl), has signed something or other about their intent to buy the Pittsburgh Penguins. Now, I'm not knocking the team, but WTF? RIM is head-quartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, about 1.5 hours SouthWest of Toronto, surrounded by Mennonite country (similar to the Amish culture). Balsillie denied a few weeks ago that he was the frontrunner to buy the team.
Why on earth would Balsillie buy a team in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania? Amish country, right? Is there some connection here? (And why a hockey team?) Well, according to the Penguins website, he's an amateur hockey player. Maybe there's also the fact that Sidney Crosby, a young Canadian player, recently joined the team.
One assumes that since the Toronto Maple Leafs were not for sale, Balsillie might have tried to create a team in Hamilton, Ontario, a city of several hundred thousand that my hockey-loving Canadian friends tell me having been dying to have a team. I mean, Balsillie supposedly spent about Cdn$100M of his own money to build a quantum physics research center (Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics) in Waterloo a few years ago. Surely Hamilton would have welcomed his money.
When I said yesterday that Microsoft and Nokia's coming "email push" communication devices were no threat, and that RIM will survive and innovate again, this wasn't what I was thinking about. But good luck anyway. If the NHL board of governors approves, Balsillie takes over ownership from Mario Lemieux's Lemieux Group LP. On the other hand, RIM might find new clients this way.
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