UPDATE: Jan. 14, 5:37 PM BlackBerry has since denied the report, sending its stock down more than 13% in after-hours trading.
BlackBerry's stock price jumped nearly 30% in late trading Wednesday after Reuters reported that Samsung approached the tech company with an offer to buy it for as much as $7.5 billion.
The Reuters report, based on "a person familiar with the matter," said Samsung was interested in BlackBerry's patent portfolio. Reps from both companies could not be reached for comment.
[seealso slug="blackberrys-turnaround-plan"]
Before Reuters' article was published, Samsung proposed buying BlackBerry for between $13.35 and $15.49 per share, which was a premium of 38% to 60% over BlackBerry's share price. That price translates to $6 billion to $7.5 billion.
Previous estimates for the worth of BlackBerry's patents have ranged from $200 million to $5 billion.
If the report proves to be true, it will be a testimony to Sybase veteran John Chen's turnaround effort at the company, which many had written off a year ago. Since Chen joined in November 2013 as CEO, he has laid off 40% of the company's workforce and launched the Passport, a 3.6-inch model with a square display. Still, the company's share of the smartphone market -- which was as high as 47% in 2010 -- is now south of 1%, according to the International Data Corporation. Chen has focused on carving out a niche in the market for business professionals who might have an iPhone for their personal life, but use a BlackBerry for work.
Chen's efforts have made a modest BlackBerry comeback likely, but the company's viability continues to be determined by its patents. In today's litigation-mad tech industry, patents are increasingly important, as evidenced by Google's $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola in 2011. Google sold Motorola to Lenovo last January, but retained the lion's share of Motorola's patents.
