BlackBerry, on Monday, announced that the executive in charge of its BBM instant messaging division, Andrew Bocking, has decided to leave the company.
“Andrew Bocking, EVP, BBM has made the decision to leave BlackBerry,” BlackBerry wrote in its statement. “We thank him for his years of leadership and contribution.”
As the company hasn’t yet decided on a potential name for Bocking’s successor, it has been announced that BBM will fall under the responsibility of John Sims until a new EVP is appointed. Sims joined BlackBerry last year in December to head the company’s enterprise unit.
Bocking was recently appointed as the head of the BBM team after he was promoted from his position as Executive VP, Software Product Management and Ecosystem at BlackBerry. Bocking played a very significant role in bringing BB10 handsets to the market.
BlackBerry said: “The BBM organization remains as a group within BlackBerry and will continue to focus on BlackBerry and BBM strength in messaging and new areas of strength such as mobile marketing, community-building and enterprise messaging”.
The Ontario based company witnessed a massive reshuffling in management ranks after John Chen took the reins late last year from former Chief Executive Thorsten Heins. It is unclear whether Bocking’s departure from the company was part of an internal management shuffle or whether Bocking had some other reasons for leaving the company.
The technology website BGR was the first to spot Bocking’s departure from the company earlier on Monday.