Smartphones are expensive, unfortunately for low-income consumers, they are also becoming more and more of a necessity for people who want to stay competitive in the modern world. As a result, low-end Android smartphones are becoming highly popular and successful way to make money. Apple will reportedly throw its hat into the low-end ring when it debuts the iPhone C in September and now, it seems Blackberry is looking to do the same thing with its new low-cost option, the BlackBerry 9720.
The new phone won't be a part of the high-end BlackBerry OS 10 line-up of smartphones but it will help the company get a foothold as a competitive low-cost option for those who aren't thrilled with Android or iOS. The newest phone will be powered by the rather old and out-of-date BlackBerry 7 OS, which last saw action in 2011.
The problem, according to The Register, is that the BlackBerry 10 OS phones require high-end components like 2GB of memory and a dual-core processor in order to run all the features. This forces all phones that want to run the best BlackBerry OS to sport smartphones that cost hundreds of dollars. Although the company promised the 10 OS would be available across all price points in 2013, it hasn't been able make good on that promise. The most inexpensive of the OS 10 devices, the Q5, costs $450. The target price range for low-end smartphones is no more than $150.
The 9720 will not be available in the West but in Asia and Latin America at first. It's a full QWERT keyboard device with the BlackBerry thumbpad, a 2.8-inch screen, has a built-in FM radio, has 320 x 480 pixel display, an 800MHz processor with 512MB of RAM, a 5 megapixel camera and a 1,450mAh battery. It's old OS has been tweaked slightly to accommodate Facebook, Twitter and BBM. The hope is that this will be another step toward bringing the company out of its current development slump and make BlackBerry a solid competitor in the mobile tech industry once again.
