As most are aware, things in the Research In Motion garden are not all too rosy at the moment, mainly due to the heavy competition in the smartphone arena from the likes of the iPhone and the abundance of Android handsets all cutting into RIM’s market share, along with their first tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook also not doing as well as expected.

Thus according to an article over on the Wall Street Journal, due to “sagging demand” for BlackBerry gear, Research In Motion is to ditch 2000 employees across its global workforce, which is roughly about 10 percent.

Apparently Research In Motion said in a statement that the reduction in the size of their workforce falls in line with the “preliminary estimates factored into guidance provided last month.”

The BlackBerry maker says that said job losses are part of the companies optimisation program, a program that focuses on “eliminating redundancies and reallocating resources to focus on areas that offer the highest growth opportunities and alignment with RIM’s strategic objectives.”

Furthermore, RIM has announced that COO Dan Morrison, who is currently on medical leave, is to retire after ten years with Research In Motion, Morrison is one of 3 chief operating officers and has been on medical leave since the middle of June for some undisclosed reason.

RIM is projecting fiscal year profit at $5.25 or $6 per share, which is considerably below their original forecast of $7.50 per share, and details of the cost of the job cuts along with other operating expense reductions will apparently be disclosed during Research In Motion’s Q2 results which are expected on the 15th of September.

Thus it would appear that RIM is having a bit of a hard time keeping up with rivals in the smartphone and tablet game, but them RIM has had quite a time at the top of the field and should have expected that sooner or later rivals would take command in the mobile space.

For too long BlackBerry has relied on the business sector, thinking that other devices wouldn’t take from their market share, but obviously this is no longer the case and it is time for RIM to come up with far better smartphone offerings if they wish to remain a large presence in the mobile space.

Unfortunately the result of this is 2000 RIM employees will find themselves without a job, but then again in this day and age and hard economic times there’s not much else RIM can do.

Can Research In Motion turn things around and get back to their former glory in the mobile arena, to do so they would need to come up with a pretty special device, or do you feel RIM has basically left it all too late?