BlackBerry has picked the Triangle for its next office.
The Canadian maker of the iconic BlackBerry mobile phone confirmed this morning it plans to open a research-and-development facility in the Raleigh area.
Research In Motion, or RIM, held a two-day job fair last month and has already begun hiring.
It's not clear how many of the thousands of area high-tech workers who have lost their jobs might be absorbed by RIM.
The new office is in the planning stages and no further details are available on the location, opening date or number of employees, said spokeswoman Jamie Ernst.
RIM is hiring to keep up with tremendous growth over the past year. Sales jumped 41 percent and BlackBerry subscriber accounts surged 70 percent. In the third quarter alone the company shipped more than 10 million BlackBerry devices.
Based in Ontario, RIM has offices in Texas, California, Florida and Illinois.
The company is directing job seekers to www.rim.com/careers.
John Murawski has been a full-time newspaper reporter since 1991, with stints at Legal Times and The Chronicle of Philanthropy (both in Washington, DC), The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Palm Beach Post (in South Florida) before arriving at the N&O in December 2004. At the N&O he covers energy (nuclear, coal, renewable, efficiency), utilities (electric, natural gas, telephone) and telecommunications. His beat includes such publicly traded companies as Progress Energy, Duke Energy, PSNC Energy, Piedmont Natural Gas, PowerSecure International, Tekelec, Cisco Systems, AT&T, among others. You can reach him at 919-829-8932 or 
