Research In Motion is reportedly exploring the possibility of licensing its forthcoming BlackBerry 10 platform to competitors such as HTC and Samsung, Jefferies & Co. analyst Peter Misek has said.

"We think some of this has already been started with RIM likely agreeing to license Blackberry 10 to Samsung, HTC, and possibly others," Misek toldInformationWeek.

"This would help create a critical mass for the ecosystem and maintain RIM's monthly service revenue; however, it puts more pressure on the hardware business in the short term. Longer term, it possibly gets people hooked on the RIM ecosystem and may in fact allow them to sell more BB 10 handsets (if they are able to create compelling handsets)."

However, the company makes the bulk of its revenues from selling hardware, not licensing software, and the company would need its software to be provided in a vast array of competing handsets to recover the loss of income that migrating to a software firm would entail.