BlackBerry issues an open letter to quell customer fears

“You’ve no doubt seen the headlines about BlackBerry,” the letter states. “You’re probably wondering what they mean for you as one of the tens of millions of users who count on BlackBerry every single day.”

The letter goes on to say that BlackBerry is debt-free and has “substantial cash on hand.”

“We are restructuring with a goal to cut our expenses by 50 percent in order to run a very efficient, customer-oriented organization,” the letter states. “These are no doubt challenging times for us and we don’t underestimate the situation or ignore the challenges we are facing. We are making the difficult changes necessary to strengthen BlackBerry.”

Then comes a list of features for productivity, security, social networking and enterprise mobility. The letter closes with this reassurance: “You can continue to count on us.”

The New York Times‘ Bits blog says BlackBerry’s letter only tells part of the story. Yes, the company has ample cash on hand, but it’s running through that cash with lightning speed. It reportedly used $500 million in cash during just one quarter.