BlackBerry outage piles pressure on RIM - Telegraph.co.uk

Analysts at Informa added that the outage "could not have come at a worse time, following some harsh criticism in recent months.

One very senior figure at one of the major telecoms companies predicted the disaster would "kill" RIM off altogether.

The company has been losing significant ground to rival smartphones such as Apple's iPhone or devices powered by Google's Android operating system, but has continued to carve a position for itself among business users on the basis that it is more secure than other providers. However, business users also require reliability more than any other audience.

Meanwhile shareholders are piling on the pressure to replace RIM's joint chief executives Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie with a "transformational" new leader.

Jaguar Financial, which owns a small stake in RIM and has been lobbying for a radical management shake-up for some time, said it had amassed support for its campaign from investors with a total shareholding of 8pc of the company.

The statement helped lift RIM shares 84 cents to C$25.14 on Tuesday despite the services outage.