<p>On market day in the small Canadian town of Waterloo, Ontario, the snow covers the car parks, and horse-drawn buggies pull up alongside the pickups. Founded two centuries ago on the prairie between the Great Lakes, Waterloo is home to the global smartphone maker BlackBerry, 500 tech companies and an institute of quantum computing, but it was first settled by German Mennonites, a religious sect who reject the inventions of the machine age.</p><p>Working the land, raising barns and crafting hardwood kitchens for the many local technology millionaires, the Mennonites and their town have thrived on BlackBerry's success. But the community's future prosperity hinges on the efforts of a more recent German immigrant, BlackBerry chief executive Thorsten Heins. Appointed 13 months ago, his mission is to arrest the decline of a company whose value has crashed from a peak of $80bn (51bn) in 2008 to $7.5bn this year.</p><p>"A year ago I felt the universe was in disarray," says Heins. "Now all the stars have really lined up." Sporting a blue shirt embossed with the company logo, his phone in a holster hung from his belt, Heins is hosting a tour of BlackBerry's sprawling 22-building headquarters.</p><p>It is two weeks after the splashy New York event, attended by BlackBerry's new creative director, the musician Alicia Keys, and beamed to press conferences in seven cities, at which Heins unveiled his company's first true internet phone, the Z10, and the BB10 operating system on which it runs.</p><p><a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/feb/17/blackberrys-hometown-wait-hope-renaissance">Keep reading...</a></p><p>Read also:</p><p><a href="http://seekingalpha.com/article/1189771-blackberry-10-no-killer-app-investors-lose?source=google_news">BlackBerry 10: No &quot;Killer App,&quot; Investors Lose</a> (Seeking Alpha)</p><p><a href="http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/business/technology/product-review-blackberry-z10-is-stab-at-rebirth-675695/">Product Review: BlackBerry Z10 is stab at rebirth</a> (Pittsburgh Post Gazette)</p><p><a href="http://www.slashgear.com/blackberry-z10-costs-about-154-to-make-16269602/">Blackberry Z10 costs about $ 154 to make</a> (SlashGear)</p><p>Explore: <a href="http://news.google.com/news/more?ncl=d5Ngqt9RJJq08CMUA4TaoaG7H0pHM&ned=us">66 additional articles.</a></p>