When I first saw this announcement on finextra I wondered a moment about a previous blog where I mentioned a letter telling me I'd won an award of a million dollars. I'm sure a few mobile technology developers will be feeling the real thing soon because unlike the scam letter in my email, this public announcement heralds some confident and advanced thinking on the part RIM and Thomson Reuters. RBC are unlikely to to find the experience unrewarding either. $150m might give enough cover to almost guarantee some successes provided the right investments are found.

RIM is the leader in their market and undoubtedly will have an even stronger lead when their investment yields fruit. And it will. There are some exciting applications and services out there being developed by some very smart young people. RIM certainly has displayed leadership in their support for carrier and manufacture agnostic solutions and maybe that comes with confidence. It  probably heralds them taking a bite into the rest of the market. They're not aiming at the 'toy' phone market, they're probably closer to the 'swiss army knife' of PDA's than the competition, or they're likely to be with moves like this.

Thomson Reuters has a lot to gain through reliable and trusted communications to back up their decision making information. After all, you have to be sure the message is genuine before you make a high value decision based on that information.  Research in the financial sector would have shown that customers at large rather than dealers in an office, probably did a little much 'due diligence' in checking information, delaying their decisions in the process. Time is money in financial decisions, and the markets operate at blazing speed. Any better way to deliver trusted and trustworthy information to their clients anywhere and make the customer's decision process faster will be a winner for them. This investment may well provide that.

I'll watch with interest as we just might see some quite fun ways to turn information into actions that surprise us all. Of course I have a few ideas of my own.