BlackBerry Android Smartphones Images Leaked
BlackBerry, who pioneered the physical QWERTY keyboard on mobile phones, is joining the Android bandwagon, finally. The company is releasing two smartphones that will run on Android and images of these phones have already been leaked even before these phones are unveiled.
BlackBerry is trying to recover from its attempt to make a comeback in the smartphone market with its BlackBerry 10 line of smartphones, which run on a proprietary OS called BlackBerry 10. When it released the BlackBerry Z10 and Q10 in 2013, both phones did not fare well among consumers and the company was forced to add support later on so that Android apps can run on their new phones.
Reuters stated that the company was contemplating on making its own Android smartphones in a bid to regain some foothold in the market, after its apparent failure with its own OS.
A more recent report in Tech Times reported that BlackBerry is indeed making a new smartphone which replaces the BB10 OS with Google's Android with a plus – a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. The smartphone project is reportedly codenamed Venice.
In addition to the Venice, which will supposedly have specifications that will rival most smartphone flagships in the market, there will be another smartphone joining the Android fray. The report cited a set of images that were leaked by a reliable tipster which showed the Venice and another phone which looked like the BlackBerry Passport, running on Android.
The BlackBerry Venice is said to feature a 5.4-inch 2560 by 1440 quad-HD display, a 16-megapixel rear-facing camera and a 5-megapixel front-facing camera. Under the hood, it will have a hexa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 processor. It is not yet known what the Android BlackBerry Passport's specifications are.
There is no definite word on the release dates of both smartphones.