BlackBerry has found a buyer, the company said Monday.

The company will be sold for $4.7 billion to a group lead by its largest shareholder, Fairfax Financial Holdings, according to a press release. BlackBerry Chairwoman Barbara Stymiest, however, said the Canadian company will also entertain other offers before it seals its deal with Fairfax.

It will be the latest chapter in the gradual unraveling of a business that once led the pack in smartphone technology, but has lost much of the ground in recent years to operating systems powered by Google's Android and Apple's iOS, the latest of which was released last week.

Just this past Friday, BlackBerry confirmed reports that it will lay off 4,500 workers, or 40 percent of its work force,  by the end of the year and will post a quarterly loss of $1 billion. The company also said it will produce only four smartphones instead of six.

"We believe this transaction will open an exciting new private chapter for BlackBerry, its customers, carriers and employees," said Fairfax Chairman Prem Watsa in a statement. "We can deliver immediate value to shareholders, while we continue the execution of a long-term strategy in a private company with a focus on delivering superior and secure enterprise solutions to BlackBerry customers around the world."

The deal with Fairfax will take the company private, which one Morningstar analyst, Brian Colello, told CNBC will allow BlackBerry to reinvent itself without public scrutiny.

"So we won't see any of these warnings or earnings releases that do nothing but disappoint investors. The company can go ahead with its strategy, as it pleases, that's a positive," Colello told CNBC.

The consortium led by Fairfax would acquire for cash all of the outstanding shares of BlackBerry not held by Fairfax, a Canadian company that already owns 10 percent of BlackBerry.

Do you think BlackBerry now has the opportunity to regain ground lost to devices running on iOS and Android?