BlackBerry just will not give up the business of selling smartphones . BlackBerry CEO John Chen told investors that in September this year the company will release a new smartphone. His presentation will take place at a special event in London.
As reported online edition of CNet, the new device will be called Passport and will be the largest in the mobile smartphone lineup BlackBerry. Passport will receive a 4.5-inch square shape with 1440 × 1440 pixels and traditional smartphone this Canadian brand QWERTY-keyboard, which I must say is impressive.
However, the surprise is that a physical keyboard is located under the huge display, which further lengthens the body smartphone. How to increase the length is unknown. If you take a sample of the keyboard BlackBerry Q10, it will lengthen the Passport almost two inches. Thus, the total length of the smartphone will be approximately 17-18 inches, which is even larger than the "giant" Samsung Galaxy Mega with a 6.3-inch screen. Due to the square shape of the display Passport also surpass Mega in width - 4.5 inches vs. 3.5 inches
During the last years of the sale BlackBerry-down devices to a minimum. Head of the company noted that the most recent quarter has sold 1.6 million BlackBerry smartphones that more 1.3 million sold in the previous year, but significantly less than in 2012 - while the figure reached 6.8 million smartphones. For comparison, in the first quarter of 2014, Apple sold 43.7 million iPhone, Samsung and so generally has shipped 85 million smartphones.
Despite the serious drop in sales, BlackBerry gradually gets to his feet, largely due to outsourcing production of its mobile devices. The company has already signed a deal with Taiwan's Foxconn to produce future smartphones.
Since joining John Chen made the BlackBerry focus on key corporate customers and software development. At the same time it continues to produce smartphones for emerging markets. Indonesia recently debuted smartphone Z3 BlackBerry, but he, according to Chen, sold modestly. However, the company does not give up and promises to continue its expansion in the Asian markets. More BlackBerry creates a platform for the Internet of Things.