BlackBerry to launch mid-range Android smartphones this year: CEO John Chen
After the Priv, BlackBerry plans to launch two new Android smartphones this year. In an interview with The National, CEO John Chen said BlackBerry plans to launch new Android phones this year, but didn’t disclose any time frame.
According to the report, Chen has said that one smartphone will sport a full touchscreen and the other will come with a QWERTY keyboard. In terms of specs, nothing else was mentioned. He further added that the phones will be priced around $300 to $400, which translates to roughly Rs 20,000 to Rs 26,000. This means, the company plans to launch new mid-range devices.
He also spoke about Priv and how it was “too high-end product” for the enterprise and that’s the reason why it has received a recent price cut. So, the price is slashed to $649 from $699. Priv was launched in India at Rs 62,990, and it is now listed at Rs 57,990 on Amazon.
Blackberry recently announced to have sold 600,000 handsets during the past three months till March end, which was lower than 850,000 units predicted by analysts. However, there is no word on how many Priv units were sold. Priv remained in a really tight spot because it had more cons than pros even though the pros are really good. It did not appeal to BlackBerry fans, thanks to badly implemented Hub, average keypad and not so thumb friendly interface like on previous BlackBerry devices. Read the complete Priv review to know more.