By AppleInsider Staff

Published: 12:30 PM EST (09:30 AM PST)

An alleged former employee of Research in Motion has revealed that RIM was incredulous over the original iPhone when Apple first unveiled the smartphone in January of 2007, according to a new report.

The BlackBerry maker reportedly held multiple "all-hands meetings" the day after the first-generation iPhone was announced, MacNN reports.

According to Shacknews poster Kentor, employees at RIM and Microsoft were "utterly shocked" by the iPhone. RIM was allegedly "in denial" about the iPhone, claiming "it couldn't do what they were demonstrating without an insanely power hungry processor, it must have terrible battery life, etc" Kentor wrote.

"Imagine their surprise when they disassembled an iPhone for the first time and found that the phone was battery with a tiny logic board strapped to it," the post read.

Apple introduced the revolutionary mobile phone on January 9, 2007. At the time, Apple chief executive Steve Jobs asserted that the smartphone was "literally five years ahead of any other mobile phone."

RIM has struggled to keep up with the iPhone's tremendous growth. During an earnings call in October, Jobs announced that Apple had passed RIM in units sold. "I don't see them catching up with us in the foreseeable future."

Verbal shots have been fired between the two companies' CEOs as the rivalry between Apple and RIM has increased. Most recently, RIM co-CEO Jim Balsillie asserted that RIM, with its unreleased PlayBook tablet, was "way ahead" of Apple and its iPad. Though the BlackBerry maker beat Wall Street estimates with its latest quarterly earnings, the company also announced that it will no longer reveal new subscriber numbers, which have slowed in recent quarters.

According to RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis, the PlayBook tablet OS will "set up BlackBerry for the next decade." Earlier this month, Lazaridis revealed in an interview that the QNX-based tablet OS will eventually be used in multi-core BlackBerry smartphones.

Sales of the BlackBerry Torch, RIM's answer to the iPhone, have been steady, but the device has failed to gain the traction that Apple's smartphone has established.