He was working for the the Canadian company for 16 years

Feb 7, 2016 03:09 GMT  ·  By

Being one of the most popular instant messengers for mobile devices, BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) was completely written by Gary Klassen, who joined the Canadian company back in 2000.

After almost 16 years with BlackBerry, the inventor of BBM has announced that he has let the company for new adventures. While the reasons for his departure are still a mystery, it's very sad to see one of BlackBerry's symbols leaving the company for good.

BlackBerry hasn't made it official yet and it probably never will, but Gary Klassen's wife, Jenn, was very happy to announce her husband walked out of BlackBerry for the last time.

“My Husband has walked out of BlackBerry for the last time! Gary you've been a wonderful example of integrity, faithfulness, and patience working there but I'm glad you're out. Now lets have some fun before you find something else to do!”

Since the launch of BBM many years ago, the instant messenger has gained a lot of fans, with the phenomenon culminating back in 2013, when BlackBerry launched the application on both Android and iOS platforms.

BBM is one of the services that BlackBerry is trying to monetize

BBM now has tens of millions of users worldwide, and it's one of the services that BlackBerry can monetize and out of which it can actually make some money.

Despite its financial troubles, BlackBerry still has a strong revenue coming from services like BlackBerry Enterprise and a few others.

Unfortunately, we can't say the same about the company's mobile division, which is probably the main reason BlackBerry is now struggling to survive.

In related news, BlackBerry confirmed earlier today the layoff of 200 employees from its offices in Canada and the United States. Gary Klassen might have been one of the employees that were let go this weekend.

Even though this is sad news, we wish the father of BBM, Gary Klassen, all the best in any of his next endeavors.